Energy Saving Malt, a less energy-intensive malt for constant quality

A new offer to reduce our customers' costs

Malteries Soufflet considers reducing its energy consumption and carbon footprint to be one of its central challenges. This is part of the company's ambition to halve its carbon emissions by 2030. Most of our customers have the same desire, especially during this time of energy crisis. Less energy-intensive, Energy Saving Malt is the solution we offer our customers, while ensuring the quality of our product and its malting value.

A new malt to meet our customers' challenges in the current geopolitical context

The control of energy consumption, its rising cost, and the global inflationary context are at the heart of companies’ concerns, and particularly those of our brewer customers.

In response to the current context, our teams have developed a less energy-intensive solution by working on the various stages of the malting process, and mainly the kilning stage, which has been identified as the most energy-consuming. During this phase, the green malt is dried at different temperature increments to lower its moisture content to 4.5%. This stage is intended to give the malt its colour and aromatic compounds, and also ensures the stability and preservation of its organoleptic qualities. These increments, ranging from 50 to 85 degrees, are an energy-intensive process. With Energy Saving Malt, we reduce the temperature used in this stage by several degrees without affecting the quality of the malt or its brewing performance. This means that our customers can choose to switch to this new, lower-cost, less energy-intensive malt, or keep a standard malt supply with their usual specifications.

"In the current geopolitical context with the war in Ukraine, controlling energy consumption and reducing costs are major concerns for many players in the food industry. Energy Saving Malt is our solution to these challenges.” Paul Wakim, Industrial and R&D Director.

Energy savings reflected in the price of our malt

In the current energy crisis context, prices have risen sharply. Our customers are trying to offset this increase in every way possible, particularly by optimising the cost of raw materials. With the Energy Saving Malt project, we are reducing our energy consumption and therefore its manufacturing cost. We can therefore offer our brewer customers a lower-priced malt, while ensuring its quality and malting value. This is a timely offer for our customers who are looking to benefit from a lower-cost malt, while guaranteeing their consumers a quality beer with a reduced environmental impact.

Thus, this innovative process makes Energy Saving Malt part of Malteries Soufflet CSR strategy in terms of sustainability, a major component of which is based on the adaptation of our malting processes, the energy optimisation of existing production equipment and the increasing use of renewable energy in our energy mix. To take this further, other projects are also being studied to develop new barley varieties whose malting process will further reduce energy consumption and therefore our carbon footprint.