Chlorinated water

[mikeroth]

Some of the posts I've read state that chlorinated water added to the wort is an absolute killer for the taste.

I've done partial boils and added water to the fermenter to get the required volume without noticeable problems and other people have tasted my brews including one guy that has drank in almost every brewpub in Chicago, IL and no-one has complained.

I'm brewing in Boonville and Veolia is our water company. According to their most recent annual report, Chlorine was listed at 1.47 ppm. So far I've been brewing ales in the spectrum from red ales to stouts.

I'd welcome some discussion on this.

Thanks

[msjulian]

Chlorine can cause off favors in beer. Another concern would be adding non-sterile water to wort. The best thing I would think would be boiling the water you need before hand and add that to make up what you need.

[mikeroth]

Thanks for your reply. I'm going to get some camp den tabs and start using them as well as boiling makeup water.

[BREWsmith]

On Club Night at this year's National Homebrewers Conference a BJCP judge said he could detect chlorine in my double IPA. I had submitted entries from that same batch to both the National Homebrew Competition and the Indiana Brewers Cup. The beer scored well at both competitions and none of the score sheets listed chlorine as a fault. Nevertheless, I'm now collecting my charcoal-filtered water the evening before I brew and treating it will potassium metabisulfite (campden tablets). Paranoid? Who, me?

[psfred]

The results of adding chlorinated water to your wort depends on how much you add, how hot the wort is, and how much chlorine is in the water.

The old homebrew method of boiling a couple gallons of wort from extract and cooling it by dumping on three gallons or so of cold tap water can be a disaster we did this once a long time ago at a demonstration, and the beer tasted strongly of chlorophenol, familiar to most people as the smell of old fashioned Band-Aids, since that was what they were treated with to reduce infection. Quite nasty.

If you are only adding a small amount of water and you are a long way from the water plant, likely you won't taste anything off, but I don't recommend chlorinated water. Chloramines are worse, since they do not evaporate easily and require hard boiling or Campden tablets to kill them.

Remember, though, that once you remove the chlorine the water is no longer sanitized, and allowing it to sit uncovered while cool can cause a wild yeast infection. Keep it covered after treating to remove chlorine.

Carbon filters which remove chlorine should be used with caution -- again, once you remove the chlorine, stuff grows in them.

Peter

Peter

[BREWsmith]

Don't I need to let it sit uncovered to off-gas the chlorine? Also, wouldn't the boil kill any nasty bugs that might try to inhabit my now unsanitized water? Obviously, water chemistry is not my strong suit! Thanks.

[psfred]

Chlorine will dissipate in a day or so uncovered, but you risk wild yeast blowing in this time of year. Not so bad where you are, but out here corn and soybeans are being harvested, tons of dust in the air.

You can also use a block carbon filter to remove the chlorine, which works well, but I don't like them because bacteria can grow in them when you remove the chlorine. Using water from one without boiling it first can be a problem.

Boiling will remove chlorine and chloramines (which do NOT evaporate readily with standing), so will adding a small amount of bisulfite as Campden tablets.

However you remove the chlorine, boil the water briefly and let it cool completely covered if you are going to use it to make up volume after chilling your wort.

You don't need to remove chlorine from mash water or sparge water, any chlorophenols produced in the mash or boil will steam distill out during the boil. You run into trouble when you add chlorinated water to cold wort -- any chlorophenols formed will stay right there, fermentation isn't enough to completely strip them out.

Peter

[SkyBrew]

Good info!