The Green Key programme achieves a world first as the Bluestone Brewing Company Visitor Centre gains accreditation
The Bluestone Brewing Company have been recognised for their sustainability efforts, and their visitor centre has become the first in the world to achieve the Green Key award in the attractions category. They are a micro-brewery based at Tyriet Farm, just outside of Newport in Pembrokeshire in Wales. The brewery and visitor centre were built in renovated farm buildings that are over 300 years old. They are a family run business and pride themselves on being eco-friendly.
Bluestone Brewing company said:
Being green has always been a huge part of Bluestone Brewing Company, so the Green Key accreditation seemed like the perfect thing for us to apply for. To be recognised as the first Green Key Brewery Visitor Centre in the world is just amazing. Hopefully, people will see what we are doing and be inspired to try to make their own businesses as green as possible. Going through the Green Key process has helped to highlight areas where we could improve, but it has also made us feel very proud of what we have already achieved to date.
Lesley Jones, Chief Executive for Keep Wales Tidy (the organisation managing Green Key in Wales) said:
We’d like to congratulate the Bluestone Brewing Company on their success in becoming the world’s first brewery visitor centre to achieve Green Key accreditation. We’ve seen mounting concern about the damage that’s being caused to our natural environment, so it’s important to recognise and celebrate Welsh businesses that are taking the lead globally on sustainability.
The brewery is unique in the sense that its uses its own water supply, where the water filters down through the surrounding Preseli Mountains and collects in a home built well. The environment agency regularly test the water and it has been found to be perfect for use without any filtration or purification. All waste water production from the brewery is gravity piped to a reed bed filtration system before it is returned to a local trout stream. The brewery also has solar panels fitted on top of the brewery building, allowing them to use a sustainable source of energy for the visitor centre and shop. In 2017, they also constructed a grass roof for the stage area, where they have planted shrubs and designed their own self-watering system.
The brewery has recently converted an old and tumbling down traditional stone building into a building suitable for a bottling plant. The bottling plant will cut transport costs and a round trip of some 345 miles per bottling run, significantly reducing their carbon footprint. the office they only used recycled paper in the printers and all light bulbs are energy saving. Any waste cardboard is given to the local gardening club to use in the garden. The aim of the establishment is to have zero waste going to landfill by the end of 2019.
For more details on the Bluestone Brewing Company’s work on sustainability visit their website www.bluestonebrewing.co.uk/green-key-success/
