Your beer needs carbon dioxide, but the price skyrocketed over the summer

[sl8]

https://www.npr.org/2022/09/22/1124491808/beer-carbon-dioxide-shortage

Your beer needs carbon dioxide, but the price skyrocketed over the summer

BILL CHAPPELL
September 22, 20222:17 PM ET

Carbon dioxide has no taste, no odor, and no color — but it's a vital ingredient in the beer business, from putting frothy bubbles in brews to blocking oxidization that makes beer taste stale.

But brewers are now worried that a carbon dioxide shortage could force production cuts and price hikes. It's the latest threat to an industry that's been whipsawed by the COVID-19 pandemic.

"We've talked to our supplier, and our supplier basically told us they were not taking on any new clients to make sure that their long-term clients have a steady supply of CO2," Bryan Van Den Oever of Red Bear Brewing in Washington, D.C., told NPR's Morning Edition.

Beer makers have dealt with carbon dioxide shortages and price hikes for much of the pandemic, similar to higher costs for aluminum cans and cardboard. But as of August, brewers' carbon dioxide costs had spiked more sharply than any other "input" cost in recent months, according to a graph shared by Bart Watson, chief economist for the Brewers Association.

And experts believe carbon dioxide will become more scarce as fall begins.

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[GoCubsGo]

1. Time to start brewing my own again...

Let the yeast carbonate it, like it's supposed to.

[Conjuay]

2. that

was what I was thinking. It’s called “brewers yeast” for a reason, isn’t it?

[GoCubsGo]

5. Yes, in naturally carbonated beer, the carbonation comes from yeast respiration.

The yeast also converts the sugar in the barley to alcohol, in the process.

[doc03]

3. Soft drinks also require CO2. Back when I made beer I bottled it and added about 1 1/2 tsp of

sugar, that made the bubbles, not yeast. You had to be careful with the sugar or the bottles would explode.

[hunter]

4. The sugar fed the yeast in the beer which made the CO2.

Beer is alive.

The stuff you buy in the grocery store is dead and frequently recarbonated just like a soft drink. Manufactures don't want their product changing while it sits on the shelf.

[mitch96]

6. "Beer is alive. "!!!!!.... First thing I though of...

[mitch96]

7. I keep getting these double sends of a reply post....grrrr

[Midnight Writer]

8. Are you using a mouse? "Double-click" inputs is a symptom of a failing mouse.

You may try a different mouse and see if that helps.

[mitch96]

10. Nope, a laptop track pad. Totally random and I've seen other people post doubles also.grrrrr.nt

[Kaleva]

9. Substitute CO2 with methane from the workers asses

Oxidation of methane converts it to CO2

[ProfessorGAC]

11. Huh?

I've been on the floor in a few industrial scale breweries. (I was observing the operation of continuous centrifuges & nobody uses them like the beer industry.)
Carbon dioxide is a reaction product of beer. IOW, beer creates it's own CO2!
There is no CO2 added.
Now, beer on tap is pushed to the tap using CO2, but that could be replaced by nitrogen in a couple minutes. (Different regulator for the cylinder as the threading is different.) 15psig og gas is 15psig of gas.
Some very low alcohol beers are re-carbonated because the removal process has some leakage. But, not Heineken or Bitburger Zero beers. The zeolite removal process is done under pressure, so CO2 isn't lost.
This impacts the soft drink industry WAY more than the beer industry.
I'm very suspicious of the statements from the brewing industry referenced in the article.
I'll be more blunt. They're lying about this. I don't know why.