Nicolas Houle, technical services manager at Labatt Breweries of Canada, leads a team to work on sustainability initiatives at its Montréal brewery.Charles William Pelletier/La Presse
Nearly five years into his career at Labatt Breweries of Canada, Nicolas Houle became manager of environment, health and safety at the Montréal brewery. It was 2018, the same year Labatt announced sustainability goals to 2025. “My team started asking, ‘Why not do things sooner?’” says Houle, now leading the brewery’s engineering, maintenance and technical services.
Houle says his team was working on incremental improvements to daily routines and operations, but it was searching for a more substantial win to get everyone on board. The team found it in a steam boiler from the 1980s that had been out of operation for years.
The boiler used Québec’s renewable electricity rather than gas and it reacted faster than current gas technology. But could they bring it back online? They did. And it ignited the team and other departments to continue to bring potential sustainability initiatives forward.
“Labatt has been committed to sustainability for more than 40 years,” says Sarah Genetti, senior director, procurement and sustainability. “It’s at the core of what we do. We rely on front-line employees to come forward with ideas to improve efficiencies, and we support them to find ways to make them happen.”
Genetti says that Houle and his team have been inspired to drive the Labatt Montréal brewery toward becoming the first carbon-neutral brewery in North America. “Our employees build on previous initiatives to take Labatt to the next level.”
Three years ago, Houle and his team began working on a plan to recycle waste energy. People at Labatt were developing longer-term goals – Labatt has announced the company’s ambition to reach carbon net-zero by 2040. With the energy infrastructure and expertise in the province of Québec, and sustainable practices becoming ingrained in the thinking of Canadians, Houle and his team felt they were well situated to make significant progress on sustainability goals.
Once they had a strategy for recycling waste energy, they needed to come up with a project plan for capital investment. They built a business case with help from colleagues working in finance and procurement and brought it to senior management. The project saw results.
In December 2023, Labatt announced capital investments in operations at three breweries across Canada. Included was $6 million for heat recovery and energy productivity innovation in its Montréal brewery.
With this new technology, the Montréal brewery will be able to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 30 per cent. The new heat recovery system will convert previously unused heat expelled from Labatt’s refrigeration systems and use that heat within the pasteurization process in brewing in lieu of consuming additional energy.
Houle finds that sustainability is top of mind for employees at Labatt. People from all different areas are bringing ideas to improve sustainability to their department meetings. More informally, an intern might question a process, or Houle might have a conversation in the hallway with someone in which he plants a seed. The next day, that person will come back to him and say, “This is what I found.”
And many Labatt employees get involved in local sustainability efforts in their communities across Canada. Last year, employees from the Montréal brewery had the opportunity to volunteer along with local organizations at an event planting trees near the St. Lawrence River.
“At Labatt,” says Houle, “people feel proud that they are making a difference.”
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