Background. Bacterial contamination is a major problem for commercial fuel ethanol production in distilleries all over the world. The contaminating microorganisms produce acetic and lactic acid that has a detrimental effect on fermentation efficiency. The aim of this work was to calculate the number of bacterial contaminants in some distilleries. Moreover, in this study it was signified what kind of bacteria contaminate ethanol production process. Material and methods. Grains were obtained from five distilleries from some regions in Poland, in this work hereafter referred to as α, β, γ , δ, and ε distilleries. Corn was the raw material in the α, β, and γ distilleries, triticale in δ distillery, and rye in the ε one. From these five distilleries, sweet mashes during fermentation and after it, were also analysed. The total number of microorganisms, the number of lactic acid bacteria, the number of anaerobic bacteria and the quantity of yeasts and moulds in raw materials were calculated. Results. The number of total viable bacteria (CFU/g), lactic acid bacteria (CFU/g), anaerobic bacteria (CFU/g), moulds, and yeasts (CFU/g) occur in the samples were determined. In all distilleries tested, all groups of microorganism were present. Conclusions. The results of our study show that all tested distilleries have a lot of difficulties with microbiology pollution which leads to a decrease of ethanol production and economical problems. From the economical point of view, reduction of microbial contamination makes it possible to increase the production volume.