Asheboro, North Carolina – Four Saints Brewing Company has partnered with Greensboro’s Urban Offsets to brew Founding Fathers Hemp Ale with a carbon-neutral process from start to finish. The beer will be released at Raleigh’s Brewgaloo, April 28.
The carbon emissions produced by brewing — from sourcing the ingredients to tapping the kegs — will be offset by renewable-energy and other projects in North Carolina that reduce carbon dioxide emissions. This is the first carbon-neutral brewing process of its kind in North Carolina and one of the first in the country.
“One of the beautiful things about being a craft brewery is we can experiment,” says Andrew Deming, co-founder and head brewer at Four Saints.
One of the emission-reduction projects supported by Urban Offsets is the Cone Health Cancer Center Healing Gardens in Greensboro. As part of its work with Urban Offsets, Four Saints will fund tree plantings at the garden.
“This project gives us the opportunity to spread some joy and hope and do something good,” says Joel McClosky, co-founder of Four Saints. “Brewing beer might not be curing major world problems, but if we can help our local community through a beer we brew and be an example for other breweries, then why not?”
Founding Fathers Hemp Ale is an English mild ale that incorporates hemp flower from Asheboro-based Founder’s Hemp. The earthy, nutty beer comes in at 3.8% ABV and 8 IBU. Last year, the beer became North Carolina’s first legally registered hemp ale.
In an effort to reduce carbon emissions and support local industry, all beer ingredients were sourced from North Carolina companies. Epiphany Craft Malt of Durham supplied the grain, and Bee Hoppy Farms in Pittsboro grew the hops.
“It’s a relatively small pilot batch, but now that the legwork is done, we can easily scale the carbon-neutral process developed with Four Saints to match a growing demand for locally crafted products that also invest in their communities,” says Shawn Gagné, CEO of Urban Offsets.
Four Saints Brewing Company is located at 218 S. Fayetteville St., Asheboro. To learn more about the brewery, visit www.FourSaintsBrewing.com. For details about Brewgaloo, go to www.ShopLocalRaleigh.org/Brewgaloo.