The Watch
LATITUDE
BREW FOLK The crew at Calgary’s Wild Rose are building upon a two-decade-plus success story. Other craft breweries are thriving in the sector, too—many of them adding their kettles to the game within the last six years.
HERE’S TO THE BOOMING CRAFT BEER INDUSTRY Calgary’s Wild Rose Brewery entered the craft beer biz in 1996, a time when the industry was decades from coming into its own. But five years ago the boom hit, after the Alberta Liquor and Gaming Commission removed the minimum output required for breweries. Being a craft brewery was especially tricky before the change, because your enterprise had to deliver 500,000 litres of the sudsy stuff a year. Since then, dozens of craft breweries have entered the scene, eager to sell their microbrews to a thirsty public. The industry’s growth has also been a boon to established companies like Wild Rose Brewery, which has seen several years of double-digit growth. This spring, the company’s shareholders agreed to be purchased by Sleeman, which is owned by Japanese multinational Sapporo Breweries Ltd. and is the third- largest brewer in Canada. This would be a first for a craft brewery in Alberta. There seems to be no sign of the craft beer boom ending. Since 2013, when the Alberta market consisted of fewer than a dozen breweries, the number had risen to 115 as of mid-May. Much of this growth is recent, with about 45 new breweries popping up since the start of 2018. A dozen more applications are in the works. It hasn’t been all sparkles and unicorns, though. This time last year, it looked like the industry’s growth might be sliding. In June 2018, the federal government
forced Alberta to end its small brewer grant program, which had been introduced in 2016 to boost new microbreweries and support economic diversification. The feds said the grants put microbreweries elsewhere at a disadvantage. The province has also faced court battles and trade challenges with other provinces. Still, Alberta’s craft beer industry is toasting its own success. FROM HARMFUL POLLUTANT TO INDUSTRIAL RESOURCE As the effect of greenhouse gas emissions on the planet becomes harder and harder to ignore, the pressure is on to find innovative solutions to a problem that threatens our very survival. University of Calgary researchers are on the frontlines of this effort, having recently come up with a method of transforming carbon dioxide and methane gas into solid carbon nanofibres. The technique involves feeding lines of carbon dioxide and methane into a small, balloon-sized chamber. Here, the gases are subjected to extreme heat and exposed to a catalyst, creating a black powdery residue. The material, good for manufacturing a variety of products, sells in either powder or brick form for $100 per kilogram.
38 | PEG SUMMER 2019
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