For more than 20 years, Actemium and Royal Swinkels have been cultivating a solid partnership based on a common ambition: to combine industrial performance with environmental sustainability.
The partnership between Royal Swinkels and Actemium – the VINCI Energies industry brand – began as a discussion about the automation of breweries and production lines, but has taken on new dimensions in recent years. The task at hand is to harness innovative solutions to support the Dutch brewer in its quest to optimise its processes, accelerate its energy transition and reduce its environmental footprint
The installation of a hot water buffer tank at its main site in Lieshout, Netherlands, aptly illustrates this dynamic. The country’s largest family-owned brewery, Royal Swinkels is known for its strong commitment to sustainable development. It has been named the world’s most sustainable brewery two years in a row, and its long-term vision and constant desire to innovate are fully shared by Actemium.
The VINCI Energies industry brand supports Royal Swinkels at every stage of the industrial life cycle, from consulting to design and from construction to maintenance. Thanks to its expertise in malting and brewing processes, custom solutions and close customer focus, Actemium is positioned as a strategic partner to Royal Swinkels in its energy transition.
Recovering “waste” heat
The hot water tank project on the main Royal Swinkels site arose from the company’s determination to make use of the significant quantity of residual heat generated by its processes.
“What makes our partnership unique is the transparency, mutual trust, and client-centred approach”
“As an integrator, we supported the project end-to-end, from conceptual design to the integration of software and hardware solutions, in collaboration with a number of partners,” explains Martijn Hallink, Business Unit General Manager at Actemium. “This was a totally unprecedented project for which there was no blueprint. We had to invent everything, which made the project fascinating to work on and stimulated our creativity and capacity for innovation.”
16% less gas consumed
The closed-loop system stores water heated to between 45 and 90 °C using heat from a variety of sources – turbines, boilers, cooking fumes and heat pumps. This energy is then reinjected into different processes including malting, brewing and packaging, especially at peak consumption times or when energy prices soar.
The results speak for themselves: a 16% reduction in annual gas consumption on the Lieshout site, equivalent to 4 million cubic metres – the amount consumed by 2,000 Dutch households; 7,000 tonnes of CO2 avoided; and savings of more than €700,000 a year.
Building on this success, Royal Swinkels and Actemium are developing a second, 4-times larger buffertank, with construction scheduled for next year.
Trust and shared vision
The success of this project was due in large part to the quality of the partnership between Royal Swinkels and Actemium. “Our Actemium customer centric approach has led to this unique partnership of mutual trust and transparency,”,” says Martijn Hallink. “When a problem occurs – which is inevitable in complex projects – we solve it together as true partners.”
The two partners share an innovation and sustainability mindset and are currently developing several projects focused on energy efficiency, predictive maintenance and advanced industrial automation. They show that technical ingenuity and sustainability can go hand-in-hand to build a more resilient, more responsible industrial future.
02/16/2026
