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Toilet-to-Tap: Singapore's Sewage Beer Delights UN Climate Change Conference

One attendee enjoyed 'a cold one made from recycled sewage water' so much that he returned for more the next day, the New York Times reports

Toilet (Philippe Gerber/Grabien), NEWBrew (brewerkz.org), tap (SolStock/Grabien)
November 22, 2024

A beer brewed from recycled toilet water has become a hit among attendees at the annual United Nations Climate Change Conference.

"At first their eyes widen," Samantha Thian, a leader of Singapore's youth delegation at the U.N. climate summit in Baku, Azerbaijan, told the New York Times. "Then we reassure them. They're usually coming back the next day for another."

The beer, a hoppy pilsner called NEWBrew, is a collaboration between Singaporean company Brewerkz and the island country's national water agency that aims to "draw attention to, and normalize, Singapore's water reclamation efforts." Singapore lacks major natural freshwater sources.

While attendees were sipping on sewage suds, the conference rejected a $250 billion proposal, mainly from Western countries, to help deal with climate change, according to Reuters. Those attendees include a delegation from the Biden-Harris administration alongside Taliban terrorists, who are attending the climate conference in hopes of receiving substantial green technology funding from the West, the Washington Free Beacon reported.

And the climate change advocates at the conference are drinking NEWBrew up, the Times reported, noting that "the beer's recycling credentials might add to its appeal among the environmentally minded at this summit."

University of Leicester biology professor Pat Heslop-Harrison, for example, enjoyed "a cold one made from recycled sewage water" so much that he returned for more the next day.

"I'm sure that the technology of Singapore is such that it's second to none," Heslop-Harrison said.

"I'll admit it's a bit of a gimmick," Singaporean national water agency chief Ong Tze-Ch'in said of the beer, "but these things do work."