Project Management and Commissioning
Owner-Side Project Management and Commissioning for Beverage and Food Plants
Brewery commissioning services exist because equipment that passed FAT can still fail in place; commissioning proves the plant as a system, a practice ASHRAE formalized and process plants borrowed. A project can look finished on paper and still fail in startup week. What is usually missing is ownership: who tested what, what was actually accepted, what is still open, and what operators were never taught. Solon works on the owner’s side of that gap, from kickoff through factory testing, site testing, startup, training, and production handoff.
What Brewery Commissioning Services Cover
Execution gates
The Gates That Keep a Project From Drifting
Commissioning has to be planned long before startup week. These are the checkpoints Solon organizes, what gets settled at each one, and why skipping it costs more later.
Kickoff
Scope, roles, decision authority, schedule, the risk list, and a single communication path. The purpose is to make ownership visible while it is still cheap to assign, so that four months in there is no argument about whose scope a gap belonged to.
Design and vendor review
Drawings, equipment submittals, vendor exclusions, utility loads, and long-lead items reconciled against each other. Most startup failures are traceable to an exclusion nobody read or a utility nobody sized.
Factory acceptance testing
Written test scripts and acceptance criteria run before equipment or panels ship, with exceptions logged and owned. Finding a problem in the shop is a conversation. Finding it in your plant is a schedule.
Site acceptance testing
Field verification of the installed system: mechanical completion, controls checks, utilities, safety functions, and interlocks proved on the equipment as installed rather than as drawn.
Startup and punch list
Sequenced startup, a punch list that actually closes, corrections tracked to a responsible party, and production-readiness verified against criteria that were agreed in advance.
Training and handoff
Operator and maintenance training on the system as built, standard operating procedures, and the documentation package your team keeps. This is the line between project mode and production mode.
Past performance
Projects Solon Has Carried to Production
These are projects where Solon held the owner-side execution role rather than advising from a distance.
Balanced Rock Brewery
Solon served as the owner’s technical representative for the duration of construction: design management, coordination between the mechanical, electrical, plumbing, and controls trades, integration of glycol, hot water, compressed air, and drain systems, then startup sequencing, punch-list closure, and production-readiness verification.
Idle Brewing — San Antonio, Texas
Production project manager on behalf of Pouring with Heart. Solon sourced, managed, and installed the full production equipment package, provided regulatory and compliance guidance, and worked hands-on with the installation crews rather than handing the work to a vendor and hoping.
Old Gregg Brewing — Austin, Texas
Carried from business planning and permitting through facility planning, equipment selection, glycol and hot liquor system design, PLC controls, commissioning, and startup, to a first commercial batch.
Stay Put Brewing — Austin, Texas
Engineering and architectural consultant working directly alongside the owner’s engineers, architect, project managers, and construction teams, including advising the rigging crews on equipment placement and installing equipment-specific cooling systems.
FMN Brewery — international
Process flow design and equipment specification across a cross-border supply chain, then PLC design, programming, and commissioning, operator training, and the cross-border regulatory coordination the project required.
Starbase Brewing
Build support and production systems. In the client’s words, Solon “essentially built our entire brewery from scratch,” with the work completed efficiently and to a high standard.
Related work
Commissioning Is Where the Disciplines Stop Being Separate
By startup week, facility, process, automation, equipment, and operations all have to answer to the same schedule. If your pressure point sits in one of these, start there.
Controls and automation implementation
When the startup depends on PLC logic, HMI screens, alarm behaviour, data, and whether operators can actually run the system.
Equipment specification and procurement
When acceptance criteria, vendor exclusions, technical review, lead times, or procurement handoff are what is holding the schedule.
Project profiles
Completed work described by industry and by the kind of problem it solved, if you want to see how a project like yours was handled before you call.
Project and Commissioning Questions
Can Solon step in after a project is already in trouble?
Yes, and it is a common way we start. A recovery engagement usually focuses on reconciling what was designed against what was installed, restoring punch-list discipline, clearing startup blockers, coordinating vendors who have stopped talking to each other, confirming controls readiness, and getting operators trained so the handoff can actually happen.
Does Solon replace our contractor or integrator?
No. We hold the owner-side technical and execution discipline so the contractor, integrator, and equipment vendors are all working to the same acceptance criteria. Your existing team keeps their contracts and their scope, and gains someone whose only interest is your plant starting up.
How early should we bring you in?
Before equipment is ordered, if you have the choice. Utility loads, vendor exclusions, access and rigging routes, and long-lead items are the items that most often reshape a schedule, and all of them are decided early.
Will you work hands-on or only manage?
Both, depending on what the project needs. Solon has advised rigging crews on equipment placement, installed cooling systems, and physically installed production equipment. We are comfortable on the floor.
What do we have at the end?
A plant that has been proved against written criteria, a closed punch list, trained operators, standard operating procedures, and the documentation set to maintain it.
Bring the Project Back to a Measurable Handoff
Send the scope, the schedule, the vendors involved, the blockers, what has been tested, and the startup date you are working toward. Solon will help you identify the next gate and what it takes to clear it.