The Alaska Brewing Company has changed everything. Not only has it almost completed a brewery powered by beer—it's a brewery that will be powered by beer without using up any of its beer. The craft beermaker, with the help of a North Dakotan partner and a federal grant, developed a furnace that burns its beer's spent grain into steam that powers its boilers, which require the majority of the brewery's energy. "Beer-powered beer," as the company put it to the AP. As will soon be explained, it's the missing link.

Most breweries in the mainland sell off their spent grain—a natural byproduct of beer-making—to farmers. It's a good source of protein for animals. But since there's too few ranches in Alaska, and shipping inland costs a hefty sum, the Juneau company needed to adapt. Hence the new system. Now, recycling is not foreign to other, larger breweries. Anheuser-Busch gets nine-percent of its boilers' fuel from wastewater. Sierra Nevada's solar panels provide about twenty-percent of its overall energy needs. But spent grain is a new frontier.

Add it to our list of things we happily consume anyway which happen to have convenient energy-making byproducts, which previously included salvaged fryer oil that runs small cars—or, if you prefer Asian cuisine, canola or soy oil, which Forbes says actually work even better. (Okay, yes, Sir Isaac Newton devotees, all things have energy-making byproducts; you know what we mean.)

But let's break this down: There are breweries that can largely fuel themselves with spent grain. That spent grain can also feed cattle. Those cattle can become burgers. Burgers go well with fries. Fries need cooking oils. Cooking oils fuel cars. Cars ship beer and cattle. We eat cattle and drink beer, making trash. Trash can power the homes we drive back to, and perhaps the rest of the breweries, too.

Self-sustaining drink, food, transportation, shelter.

A brewery just solved energy and humanity.

Nate Hopper Associate editor Nate Hopper is an associate editor for Esquire magazine.

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