“The cool part about this project is it makes it easy and delicious for our customers to be green,” he said.
The brewery is helping a local utility, Missoula Electric Coop, to invest in technology it might not have had room for on its roof.
“We were offered this opportunity,” O’Leary said. “Their board was extremely supportive of this project.”
It wasn’t much of a challenge for Kettlehouse to get involved.
“We were able to invest our time and opportunity cost at this time because of the help MEC provided,” he said. The brewery’s cost was that they had to give up a few free pints every day.
The solar panels won’t be used by Kettlehouse, but it does help raise community awareness, and O’Leary said that those that purchase the panels for use will get a free pint with each visit to the Bonner, Montana taproom.
“Not a big deal,” O’Leary said. “We also lost some roof space that we could have used for our own array. So weighing the options wasn’t too hard.”
O’Leary added that it’s extremely important to be more green and sustainable with the same fanaticism and vigor that Kettlehouse approaches making beer.
Photo courtesy Jeffrey Neubauer /Neubauer Media
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