If you put beer in cans your beer is bad and you should feel bad. IF YOU CAN'T BUY BEER CANS IN THE UNITED STATES YOU NEED TO FUCK OFF YOU HIPSTER FUCKWITS. No, they don't. They add up to a penny per can. That's six cents per six pack. For imported off-shore Japanese beer cans. Marc Reisner argued in Cadillac Desert that it wasn't the Atomic Bomb that won WWII for the United States, it was Grand Coulee Dam, which produced so much excess electricity that it allowed not just the massive production of aluminum in Portland, Seattle and Blaine (and massively consumptive electromagnetic uranium refining at Hanford). It's not like American beer cans are unavailable.Central Ohio is home to more than 40 craft breweries, and many of them can their own beer.
Seventh Son Brewing, like many local breweries, gets its cans from outside the country. Seventh Son co-founder Collin Castore says local breweries using aluminum cans can only get them from outside the U.S. because no stateside manufacturers make the type of cans they need.
Castore says even though the tariffs only increased prices by about a penny a can, those pennies add up.
Honestly, I've never tasted a difference, and I used to drink a lot of beer, both in quantity and variety. Once again, it's a bit mixed. Aluminum is harsher for the environment to make outright than glass, but when you look at quantity recycled in raw numbers, energy used, and amount of materials recovered, things get interesting again. As a result of bauxite mining's environmental toll, manufacturing a 12-ounce aluminum can is twice as energy-intensive as making a similarly sized glass bottle: 2.07 kilowatt hours of electricity for the can vs. 1.09 kilowatt hours for the bottle. But those figures assume that the materials used in the containers are 100 percent virgin—that is, entirely lacking in recycled content. The average beer can contains 40 percent recycled aluminum, while American beer bottles are typically composed of 20 percent to 30 percent recycled glass. But the energy savings that accumulate when you recycle a ton of aluminum are far greater than they are for glass—96 percent vs. a mere 26.5 percent. So if your brewery uses cans that contain lots of secondhand aluminum, the bottle's environmental edge narrows considerably. That edge vanishes if your beer is trucked across several states. Without its liquid payload, the average beer can weighs less than an ounce, while an empty bottle clocks in at close to 6 ounces. That disparity makes a real difference in terms of overall greenhouse-gas emissions, since heavier items require more fuel to transport.Cans taste like cans.
And the argument that aluminum recycles better than glass is pure bullshit. You melt glass. You purify aluminum.
That you can't taste a difference does not negate the fact that I can. Your link, from 2009, says that if your aluminum can uses a lot of recycled material and if your bottle does not and if your bottle has been shipped a long way, the edge glass has over aluminum goes down. It doesn't disappear. It also doesn't account for buying fucking beer cans from Japan. It also says Point to the aluminum. No, not that one. That one's steel.Honestly, I've never tasted a difference, and I used to drink a lot of beer, both in quantity and variety.
Once again, it's a bit mixed.
Glass bottles would make more environmental sense if they were refillable, as they are in parts of Europe and Canada.
I never meant to imply that it did. It'd be interesting to know how many people can tell a difference and whether or not that affects their purchasing decision, especially if they're trying to factor other things such as price, availability, perceived eco-friendliness, etc. Indeed it does. But, your original statement was that glass is a better material to recycle than aluminum, which was what I was addressing. I'd like to point out that your counter statement also contains an "if." if they were refillable if <--- see? right there. Whether or not it's from 2009 is probably a moot point, if the data is still consistent. If we have new data to work with, obviously that'd be better. Either way, it's good information to have when we're trying to look at best practices for consumer habits, marketing, and whether or not we choose to recycle or reuse. If we want to focus on recycling and long shipment times are the norm, maybe aluminum is better. If we try to focus on re bottling and aim to keep things local (which I always encourage doing local), then bottles are probably the better way to go. Or, like the article says, maybe we oughta pay more attention to kegs. If we go back to the flavor argument, I think draft was always the best choice, so that's another point in the favor of kegs. On a personal note, it's interesting that this article is from 2009. That's about the time I started paying attention to stuff like this. The first thing that got me thinking was the often made argument that it would be more environmentally friendly to buy a used Hummer and drive it to death than buy a brand new Prius. That got me looking into all sorts of things, from whether or not it's environmentally friendly to recycle paper, whether or not the Forest Stewardship Council is an effective organization, the best way to dispose of batteries, composting, on and on and on. It seems the answer for so many of these questions tend to be "Well, it depends" and half the time the "it depends" is about consumer habits. Thanks for having this conversation with me. You got that part of my noodle cooking again.That you can't taste a difference does not negate the fact that I can.
Your link, from 2009, says that if your aluminum can uses a lot of recycled material and if your bottle does not and if your bottle has been shipped a long way, the edge glass has over aluminum goes down.
Glass bottles would make more environmental sense if they were refillable, as they are in parts of Europe and Canada.
Your linked article assumes that the aluminum is already recycled. It doesn't say anything about the recycling process. My argument was: Your counterargument was "it depends" and then you linked to an article that says, effectively, glass isn't NECESSARILY the winner. The "if" you're attributing to me isn't mine, it's the article's: my position (glass is better than aluminum) is challenged theoretically by your article, but practically let stand. It also says while newer sources call those statistics into question. So... that "if" you're trying to hang on me? The "if" I used - "if they were refillable" - is above an assortment of growlers, the hipster refillable beer container of choice around here. Meanwhile, ...we're discussing a company that insists on buying its beer cans from Japan. By the way: It's more environmentally friendly to walk. "should I buy a new thing or a used thing" - well duh, buy the used thing. The question isn't new Prius or used Hummer, the question is new Prius or NEW Hummer.And the argument that aluminum recycles better than glass is pure bullshit.
The average beer can contains 40 percent recycled aluminum, while American beer bottles are typically composed of 20 percent to 30 percent recycled glass
If we want to focus on recycling and long shipment times are the norm, maybe aluminum is better.
The first thing that got me thinking was the often made argument that it would be more environmentally friendly to buy a used Hummer and drive it to death than buy a brand new Prius.
If the idea I'm putting forth is "it depends" and I linked to an article that talks about the variables between aluminum and glass, then the article supports the idea I'm putting forth. Never in my original comment or any follow up comment did I talk about specific companies. I'm just comparing glass to aluminum and the pros and cons of each, in this instance, recycling, shipping, consuming, etc., and looking at general ideas. I feel like you and I are using the same words, but we're having two different conversations. Why we're having two different conversations, I do not know and I don't really have any desire to analyze why. That said, we both shared ideas, hopefully we both got something out of it, so lets call it a night before this conversation devolves into fruitless quibbling. Thank you again though, because like I said, you got the noodle cooking.Your counterargument was "it depends" and then you linked to an article that says, effectively, glass isn't NECESSARILY the winner.
we're discussing a company that insists on buying its beer cans from Japan.
i wonder if, for some person out there, this would be the final straw
Probably for someone. But NPR interviewed a bunch of Harley workers in Wisconsin the other day and the consensus was that the tariffs are good even if they lose their jobs due to them. My dad works in the aluminum industry so this has to be a giant headache for him. But my brother told me he's blaming Kim Jong Un or something. The man is aggressively stupid, prone to the kind of smart assery I am and mostly apolitical. So his true feelings are basically unknownable The Trump base is deeply loyal in the way a mafioso is loyal to a don (hurr). I hope it's not a viable strategy to keep leaning harder and harder on the base but I'm not going to speculate on the 2020 election because I don't know what's going to happen in the next two years and Trump proved that speculation is pointless even in the moment