SEWAGE -BEER TECHNOLOGY- SEARING : MASTER GLOBAL ESSAY

 

BAKU - AZERBAIJAN : ' Sewage Beer ' hits the spot with COP29's eco-conscious delegates. 

Food and drink, the fuel that keeps negotiators negotiating and reporters reporting, always gets a lot of attention at climate summit meetings.

At this year's meeting, the Australian delegation was a favorite for its complimentary coffee. Another popular spot was the Azerbaijani pavilion where the hosts served strong tea from gleaming silver samovars.

AND THEN there were the Singaporeans. They were giving out free beer made from recycled toilet water.

Delegates and observers in the talks, held in a retrofitted soccer stadium on the edge of Baku, the Azerbaijan capital, didn't seem to mind. In fact, the beer's recycling credentials might add to its appeal among the environmentally minded at this conference, known as COP29.

'' At first their eyes widen,'' said Samantha Thian, one of the leaders of Singapore's youth delegation in Baku. '' Then we reassure them. They're usually coming back the next day for another.''

A hoppy pilsner called NEWBrew, the beer is part of a collaboration of a Singaporean company called Brewerkz and the country's national water agency. The project is designed to draw attention to, and normalize, Singapore's water reclamation efforts.

As word of the so-called sewage beer got around, some conference attendees stopped by the Singaporean pavilion for a curious taste.

Others, like Pat Heslop-Harrison, a professor of biology at the University of Leicester in England, just wanted a drink that didn't involve trekking out of the stadium.

It was only after he'd cracked open a can, Dr.Heslop-Harrison said, that he realized he was drinking a cold one made from recycled sewage water.

He liked it so much that he came back the next day. '' I'm sure that the technology of Singapore is such that it's second to none,'' he said.

Some patrons were more sheepish about trying the beer. One taster was glad to share his review - '' fresh '' and '' not so bitter '' - but not his name, lest his boss discover he'd been day-drinking at a U.N. summit meeting.

Another, Julian Reingold, an Athens based journalist, stepped by for a swig as the negotiations seemed to bog down in their second week.

'' If we were to drink more of that beer, I don't know how the negotiations would turn out,'' Mr. Reingold said. ''Maybe better. Who knows?''

The World Students Society thanks Rebecca F. Elliott.