Learning about the Ore Dock Brewing Company’s green business model

During Craft Beer Week there are a lot of beer pairings taking place.

An unusual combination of Beer and Energy talks took place Thursday, and it seems a Marquette business is a model to drink to.

Business leaders, residents, and community organizers gathered today over a nice cold one to talk about how businesses can further improve their carbon footprint.

The meeting was held at the Ore Dock Brewing Company because in establishing its business, the brewery’s owners took energy seriously and created a model to be duplicated.

“We’re basically taking a cue from the craft beer industry of where it seems that this niche industry–whether it’s here in Marquette or across the state of Michigan or the Midwest have really taken–they’re really taking seriously sustainability, green energy, and making sure that they are doing the best that they can to reduce that amount of energy they are using,” MI Energy Options U.P. office manager Michael Larson said.

“Pretty much material that we took out of the building we try to put back in in some way, so we reused a lot of the wood and metal in the building as well as locally sourcing many of the elements that we used to decorate the brewery,” Ore Dock Brewing Company co-founder Andrea Perstenier said.

“As far as the brewery is concerned, what we’re doing in there is we do have a heat exchanger that allows us to take the water we use to cool what’s coming from the brewhouse, we take that and we take the cold water that then becomes warm, we put that in our hot liquor tank and we’re able to reuse that. So we do have a nice way to reuse what would normally be wastewater.”

Pernsteiner said they also decreased their garbage amount by 75% and increased recycling by 100%.