The historic old town section of Carbondale, Colorado got a major boost last spring when renovations to the building at 150 Main Street were completed, revealing a new distillery, tasting room and inn, as well as a look at the future of sustainability in the craft beverage industry.
In May of 2015, the Marble Distilling Co. & The Distillery Inn officially opened up to the public and introduced the world to the building’s celebrated green design elements that more than exceed the Town of Carbondale’s Green Building Code requirements. Using a Water Energy Thermal System (WETS™) pioneered by the distillery’s ownership and design team, MDC is making waves in the distilling industry as the first craft distillery in the U.S. to recapture 100% of it’s process water and harvest the energy from that water to heat and cool the building, which features a distillery, tasting room, five inn rooms and an event space. The innovative system recirculates and stores heat and cold water, eliminating hot water discharge to the sewer as well as the use of fresh water for cooling operations. Through a series of heat exchanges, improved controls and two 5,000 gallon storage tanks, the distillery is on pace to save 4 million gallons of water and 1.8 billion BTUs (enough energy to power twenty Carbondale homes) in their first year of business.
The forward-thinking WETS™ design system has earned the Marble Distilling Co. the Exceptional Implementation of Sustainable Technologies award from the U.S. Green Building Council of Colorado as well as significant grant funding from the United States Department of Agriculture and the Community Office for Resource Efficiency. The WETS™ system along with the distillery’s 4.85 Kilowatts of rooftop Photovoltaics has also merited MDC a Zero Energy Performance Index rating of 6.98, falling well under Carbondale’s minimum requirement rating of 47.
The forward-thinking team at the Marble Distilling Co. expects the payback of their long-term sustainability investment to take less than ten years. In the meantime, owner and distiller Constance Baker is committed to inspiring the craft beverage industry to take action on reducing the high volumes of water being wasted in distilleries and breweries on a daily basis. And when the team at MDC isn’t busy researching ways to become an even more sustainable operation, they’re busy producing award-winning spirits like the Moonlight Expresso, Crystal River Vodka 80 and Gingercello. Check out the distillery’s innovative design by visiting the Marble Distilling Co. tasting room during their hours of operation Tuesday through Saturday, or book a stay at one of the Inn’s modern rooms situated above the distillery and tasting room.
