Hawaii Island Business Report 2018
Environmental Innovation is the New Way to Design
Kona Brewing Co. will open new brewery in Kona in 2019
Photography Courtesy of Kona Brewing Co.
There is something deliciously innovative and environmentally sustainable brewing on the west side of Hawaii Island. In May, Kona Brewing Co. broke ground on their new 30,000 square foot brewery, leasing 2.6 acres in Kailua-Kona from the Queen Liliuokalani Trust. This location is just down the street from the original Kona Brewery & Pub. It will allow Kona Brewing Co. to drastically increase the amount of beer it produces in the state, says Senior Hawaii Market Manager Eric Chang.
“We’re taking our modest, 14,000-barrel brewery and increasing capacity to 100,000 barrels. The new brewery will also have a canning line,” explains Chang. “We’re taking the years of experience of everyone involved to build a world class brewery right here in Kailua-Kona. This is an opportunity to focus on sustainability … minimize the impact on the environment, while also benefiting the community and the city of Kona.”
A water treatment and renewable energy company will design and build an on-site Resource Recovery Center. This patented technology will recycle the organic brewing byproducts, extracting the energy potential and reusing it to produce electricity, heat and clean water for the brewery.
In addition, they will be using a High Efficiency Brewing System (HEBS) that uses a mash filter to extract wort from the mash instead of a lauter tun. This gives them significantly greater malt and water efficiencies. The mash filter will also allow them to be even more innovative with their recipes.
The new brewery will also be capturing the CO2 that is created from the fermentation process says Senior Director of Kona Operations Billy Smith.
“Two major byproducts of fermentation is alcohol, the fun stuff, and CO2, the bubbles in beer. A lot of breweries our size let CO2 go off into the atmosphere but CO2 is actually an important part of the process, not only to carbonate beer but also to purge tanks of oxygen,” explains Smith. “So, what we’re going to have in the new brewery is a Co2 reclamation system that takes CO2 from the fermentation process, cleaning it, and reusing it. This will allow us to become completely independent from having to get CO2 brought in for us. With there being no CO2 production plants here in Hawaii, it all gets shipped over from the mainland. So, this innovative addition reduces the carbon footprint of bringing over many loads of CO2 via a ship. It also helps us with our bottom line as well.”
Kona Brewing Co. invested more than $20 million in modern technology and innovation to ensure the new brewery meets their standards for efficiency and sustainability. A minimum of $7 million of this investment will go to local contractors and vendors.
“We are currently putting together a hiring plan based on the new brewery’s capabilities and forecasted production needs,” says Smith. “Every department, Brewing, Quality and Maintenance will see an increase in headcount. We will even be adding a new position to run the Kona Resource Recovery Center. Recruiting will start towards the end of summer.”
The brewery is set to open in 2019, which will be the company’s 25th anniversary. In 1994, father-son duo, Cameron Healy and Spoon Khalsa, started the craft beer company. In 2010 it was purchased by Craft Brew Alliance. Today, Kona Brewing Co. beer is distributed in 50 states in the U.S. and 30 countries.
Despite the company’s exponential growth, Kona Brewing Co. understands its kuleana to Hawaii Island and local brewers. For the past 23 years, Kona Brewing Co. has hosted the Kona Brewer’s Festival, arguably the largest craft beer festival in the state, which brings together 40 breweries. In 2018, the festival raised $1.5 million for Hawaii Island charities.
If the Hawaiian craft beer breweries were a real-life ohana then Kona Brewing Co. is like the eldest brother that went off to college on the Mainland, became financially successful and returned to the Islands to grow the family business. Currently, Kona Brewing Co. is collaborating with their younger bro, Ola Brewing Co., on a new beer.
“It was just a natural thing.” says Smith. “Well, they’re our neighbors, and we share space. We share consumers, a town, and more importantly, we share a brewing community. It’s just naturally how it works between breweries, we’re there for each other … It wasn’t too long ago where we were in a bit in a bind and we needed some glycol for our cooling system for our fermenters. We reached out to Ola and they were more than happy to help and came to the rescue, and in return we were able to help them with technical brewing support. It’s the unspoken word of friendship and family, ohana, that you have within the brewing community.”
