MillerCoors says it is dedicated to sustainability. Last month, the company officially reached its goal of having all of it's major breweries be landfill-free, including the one in Golden.

“As we continue our journey to brew a sustainable future, maintaining landfill-free operations at all our major breweries will make a significant impact,” said Kim Marotta, MillerCoors Director of Sustainability. “While we continuously strive to reduce waste, we will also remain focused on our other sustainability priorities, including preventing drunk driving, further decreasing our water use, lowering our carbon emissions, and making greater investment in our people and our communities.”

Here are some the details about the company's conservation efforts:

Landfill-free

In February, all major MillerCoors breweries became landfill-free when its Fort Worth brewery. Landfill free means MillerCoors uses or recycles nearly 100 percent of it's waste.

Recycled materials include spent grain, aluminum, plastic and cardboard. The less than one percent that cannot be reused or recycled such as cafeteria and bathroom waste and floor sweepings, are sent to a wate-to-energy facility.

The first of the major MillerCoors breweries to achieve the landfill-free status was the Trenton, Ohio, brewery in 2009. Since then MillerCoors breweries have reduced waste across the organization by 89 percent, equal to keeping more than 9 million pounds of waste out of local landfills according to the company.

The Golden brewery became landfill-free in 2013 and since then has reduced its waste by 35 percent. In 2015, the plant eliminated 68 tons of waste that had previously gone to a landfill.

Also, the Rocky Mountain Metal Container, an aluminum can plant used by MillerCoors located in Golden, achieved landfill-free status in 2015.
“MillerCoors has a long heritage that is built on a foundation of sustainable brewing,” said Phil Savastano, vice president of the MillerCoors Golden brewery. “Our commitment to reusing and recycling dates back to Bill Coors who believed that 'waste is a resource out of place.' It's a principle that guides our operations to this day.”

Recycling

In 2014, the Colorado Association for Recycling awarded the MillerCoors Golden Brewery the Colorado Recycler of the Year.
The plant recycled 82 percent of its waste in 2015.

MillerCoors' Rocky Mountain Bottle Company, a local glass plant, uses about 240 tons of recycled glass per day on average. In addition, the glass plant provides free glass recycling drop-off locations in the community and each employee is provided with a glass recycling bin for personal use at home.

“Here in Golden, we believe in empowering our employees so they know their actions matter to the company's overall success,” said Fred Linton, MillerCoors environmental health and science engineer. “Achieving landfill-free status and continuing to reduce our waste year-over-year is the result of this employee-driven culture.”

Other initiatives

The MillerCoors Golden brewery has a car-charging station with two charging heads. Eight employees currently take advantage of the station to charge an electric car.

In 2015, the Golden brewery reduced its water waste by 1 percent over 2014.

The Golden brewery is also working to reduce its carbon emissions. By the end of March, the goal is to have converted to natural gas, thus eliminating all coal inventories.

Each year since 2011, the Rocky Mountain Bottle Company makes a donation to the Arvada Food Bank for the approximate value of the glass received at the glass plant's Arvada glass recycling drop-off.

“We are committed to finding innovative ways to build on our heritage of brewing high-quality beer sustainably,” said Gavin Hattersley, MillerCoors CEO. “We didn't reach this milestone overnight, nor can we attribute success to one department, one brewery or one employee. The entire MillerCoors family is committed to ensuring a sustainable future for our company and the communities in which we work and live.”