CLEVELAND — Concern is brewing over the strained supply of a key ingredient in beer. A nationwide carbon dioxide shortage is affecting the craft brewing industry.
“It’s like your gas bill, right? You kind of don’t think, ‘How much am I using?’ You just know it’s available to you and you don’t really worry about it because it’s never been this kind of an issue before,” said Luke Purcell, the brewmaster at Collision Bend Brewing Company in Cleveland.
He explained the invisible gas is used to purge oxygen from tanks and containers and give beer its refreshing fizz. It’s also a byproduct released during fermentation.
“CO2’s used during most of the process,” he said.
In the past several years, the wrong ingredients combined to create a national CO2 shortage. The Ohio Craft Brewers Association told News 5 supply has been tight since the spring of 2020, when COVID-19 outbreaks and pandemic shutdowns limited production and delivery.
More recently, one of the country’s largest natural sources of food grade CO2, the Jackson Dome area in Mississippi, began experiencing contamination issues with its raw gas. At the same time, key ammonia plants shut down for both planned and unplanned maintenance. The slowdown in production coincided with peak demand during the summer months.
“We’re getting a lot of things hitting brewers all at once and it’s really expected to continue here through the fall,” said Kaylyn Kirkpatrick, a technical brewing project manager at the Brewers Association.
She explained sourcing challenges appear to be the worst in the southeast U.S., but Brewers Association members have reported issues from around the country.
Purcell said Northeast Ohio is just beginning to notice changes. Collision Bend’s CO2 supplier recently began limiting the amount it will distribute to customers, and the brewery itself is doing its best to reduce waste.
“You use what you use and you try to minimize it,” he said. “You turn the lights off when you leave the room. It’s the same kind of thing.”
The CO2 shortage is one of the latest challenges brought on by inflation and the global supply chain crunch. Purcell said the industry has recently felt the effects of poor crops of hops, as well as rising costs of supplies and limited delivery drivers.
“People have been making beer for hundreds of years and have probably been used to those things happening. A CO2 shortage - it’s the first time I’ve experienced it in 25 years in the business,” he said. “If this shortage thing really happens and gets worse, there could be trouble.”
The Brewers Association expects several more months of tight CO2 supply as more manufacturers shut down for routine maintenance. It says the Compressed Gas Association doesn’t expect relief until October.
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