Diageo has opened a new carbon-neutral brewery at Littleconnell, Co Kildare.

The brewery will be officially opened with Taoiseach Micheál Martin and Diageo CEO Dave Lewis in attendance on Monday, 11 May.

It is understood Guinness will continue to be brewed at St James's Gate brewery in Dublin.

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The home of Guinness will be transformed into a carbon-neutral facility. Meanwhile, it is understood that other drinks like Rockshore, Smithwicks, Carlsberg, Harp, Hop House 13 and Kilkenny will be brewed in Co Kildare.

The brewery has been built in approximately two years, having first been delayed due to objections to the planning application.

Challenge

Planning was initially granted for the brewery. However, a subsequent high court challenge delayed the brewery's build until it was withdrawn on 1 May 2024.

At that time, there was strong support for the brewery to be built from the tillage industry and farm organisations.

Future plans

The new brewery has just opened and there are already plans for expansion at the 40ac Littleconnell site.

On 24 March this year, Diageo received a 10-year planning permission to build a second brewery on the same site at Littleconnell, Co Kildare. The expansion would result in a doubling of capacity at the site to 4.5m hectolitres.

Taoiseach Micheál Martin said: “Today’s opening of Diageo’s new Littleconnell Brewery in Co Kildare is a powerful vote of confidence in Ireland and in our future as a world leading, sustainable food and drink exporter. This landmark facility forms part of Diageo’s near €1bn investment in Ireland between 2020 and 2029, underlining the central role Ireland plays within the company’s global brewing network and highlighting the strength of our agri food and drinks sector on the international stage.

Dave Lewis, CEO of Diageo said: “The demand for Guinness and Guinness 0.0. is surging. Today Diageo is proud to unveil our new state-of-the-art brewery at Littleconnell, part of our €1bn investment in Ireland. How fitting that it’s in Co Kildare, the birthplace of Arthur Guinness.”

What does it mean for farmers?

The expansion is a positive one for Irish tillage farmers.

Diageo uses 130-140,000t of Irish barley and malt each year and prides itself on purchasing Irish grain.

However, it now looks like more product will be produced and more grain may be needed which should create more demand for Irish barley

Diageo and Guinness also seem to be bucking the drinks industry trend as, at present, malting barley markets are in a poor place, mainly due to a lack of demand in distilling markets.

It is not yet clear how much extra grain will be needed for the breweries.

Originally, the new brewery looked like it was to facilitate upgrade of the St James's Gate brewery to carbon neutral and the other products were to be moved to another site. However, it now looks like more product will be produced and more grain may be needed which should create more demand for Irish barley.

Farmers will no doubt welcome the major development, but have also grown frustrated with the increases in the price of the pint.

In February of this year, the price of a pint of Guinness was increased by 7c by Diageo. In that time, the price of malting barley has declined.

As Irish barley carries such a low carbon footprint, this can only be a positive for Diageo's brewery and its sustainability goals as the company focuses on these topics.