Brewery creates ‘world’s first carbon-negative’ beer

A brewery claims to have created the world’s very first carbon-negative beer.

Gipsy Hill Brewery in Hamilton Road, Norwood, has created a new Swell Lager and Trail Pale, which are brewed using barley grown through regenerative farming and hops which have been recaptured and reused.

This means each pint removes more greenhouse gasses from the atmosphere than it produces. 

The brewery said it is the first time a carbon-negative beer has been created without using carbon offsetting, a controversial process where businesses reduce their carbon footprint through activities unrelated to their production, for example planting trees in another part of the world.

Sam McMeeken, co-founder of Gipsy Hill Brewery, said: “Making great quality beer has been our obsession for 10 years, but I felt we had to find a way to do it more sustainably. 

“Great beer should be guilt-free, and our new Trail Pale and Swell Lager mean that for the first time, our drinkers can enjoy a pint safe in the knowledge it’s actively improving the environment and helping solve our climate crisis.”

Gipsy Hill’s latest beers have carbon footprints of -40g of carbon dioxide for Swell Lager and -30g of carbon dioxide for Trail Pale per pint respectively. 

A typical pint of commercial lager produces at least 350g of carbon dioxide, with many craft IPAs starting at 500g.

The brewery believes the beers are the only ones in the world to be made using certified regenerative barley, sourced exclusively from Wildfarmed, an organisation that rewards farmers for regenerative farming.

These farmers use practices like intercropping, cover cropping, and reduced tillage, which improve soil health, reduce erosion and store carbon. 

These practices mean that the process of farming the barley stores more carbon in the soil than it releases into the atmosphere.

Gipsy Hill then combines the barley with recaptured hops. Recaptured hops are the hop material that has been removed after fermentation from a previous batch of beer and then reused to bitter and flavour a new batch of beer. They would usually be thrown away in a typical brewing process.

The complete carbon life cycle of the beers has been independently analysed by Zevero, a specialist carbon accounting firm. 

The study accounted for the full life cycle of the products, from the growing of the ingredients to the end of life of packaging.

Edd Lees, co-founder at Wildfarmed added: “We’re thrilled to be working with Gipsy Hill to create a beer that not only tastes great, but is great for the planet too.

“We’re making it easy for people to help solve some of the world’s biggest problems with regenerative soil.”

Pictured top: Gipsy Hill Brewery employee brewing the zero carbon beer (Picture: Gipsy Hill Brewery)