Where do you get your brewing water from?

[Beer-lord]

Hopefully not from San Diego!

SAN DIEGO (AP) -- Acknowledging California's parched new reality, the city of San Diego has embraced a once-toxic idea: turning sewer water into drinking water.

The City Council voted unanimously Tuesday to advance a $2.5-billion plan to recycle wastewater, the latest example of how California cities are looking for new supplies amid a severe drought.
Each of the nine council members effusively praised the effort before the vote as a way to make San Diego less dependent on imported water and insulated from drought.
"We're at the end of the pipeline," said Councilman Scott Sherman. "We have a real problem getting water down here."
Such recycling, called toilet-to-tap by critics, has suffered an image problem that industry insiders call "the yuck factor."
San Diego, a city of 1.4 million people that imports 85 percent of its water from the Colorado River and Northern California, has slowly warmed to the idea. A 2012 survey by the San Diego County Water Authority showed that nearly three of four residents favored turning wastewater into drinking water, a major shift from one of four in a 2005 survey.
"The drought puts a finer point on why this is so necessary," Mayor Kevin Faulconer said. "Droughts are unfortunately a way of life in California, so we have to be prepared. This helps us to control our own destiny."
The plan calls to initially recycle 15 million gallons by 2023 and 83 million gallons a day by 2035, about one-third of the city's water supply. It enjoys broad support from business groups and environmental advocates.
The Orange County Water District, which serves 2.4 million people in California, plans to boost production of recycled water next year from 70 million gallons to 100 million gallons a day. It has reused wastewater for drinking since 2008 through treatment that includes sending water through ground basins.
The Santa Clara Valley Water District, which serves 1.8 million people in the San Francisco Bay area, decided in September to pursue construction of facilities that it says could lead to turning wastewater into drinking water for Sunnyvale and western Santa Clara County.
Still, it remains rare to turn sewage to drinking water. The WateReuse Association, a group of agencies behind the efforts, counts only 10 projects nationwide, including El Paso, Texas, and Fairfax County, Virginia. Two Texas cities, Wichita Falls and Big Spring, started projects within the past two years.
On Tuesday, the San Diego council ratified an agreement between the mayor and four environmental groups - San Diego Coastkeeper, Surfrider Foundation, Coastal Environmental Rights Foundation and San Diego Audubon Society - to ask the Environmental Protection Agency for another reprieve and to commit to the recycled wastewater plan. Unlike Orange County, San Diego plans to send water through a reservoir because it lacks groundwater basins.
Richard Nagel, general manger of the West Basin Municipal Water District, which serves about 900,000 people in Southern California, said he has fielded inquiries from about a half-dozen agencies lately who are interested in recycling wastewater. His agency began in 1995 in response to an earlier drought.
"It's the investment you make for a locally produced, drought-proof water supply," he said.

[mashani]

If it's good enough for astronauts...

Honestly, we pretty much all go toilet to lake/river/ocean etc. (where I live sometimes more directly then you would like depending on how big of a storm there is)... and then that ends up back in the tap eventually...

And it's safe to make beer out of it at least

[RickBeer]

Last I checked, most communities process sewage and dump it into rivers or oceans. Those downstream on the rivers process it as drinking water.

I had to laugh last year when that reservoir in CA(?) was dumped because one kid took a leak. No one added up all the bird crap that goes in there, the fertilizer run off, the fish crap, ...

I guess this gives new meaning to "this beer tastes like p*ss!"

[Beer-lord]

In our area, 'grey' water is ok but sewerage is a defininte no-no. I'm not sure but I think there's a difference between recycling water and treated water in most municipalities.

I've subscribe to the youtube channel you list and remember his Pond water beer. I know he's sent some bottles around and it wasn't very good. I'm not sure if that was because of the goldfish crap or not.

[ScrewyBrewer]

Blech! Isn't that the same exact reason people started brewing beer, to kill off all the nasties in the water of their day?

[FrozenInTime]

Uh... ewwwwwwwwwwww
I get mine from our artisan well ty.

[mashani]

Sewage is a no-no, but we treat sewage and put it back in the water supply already. This is just a more direct way of putting it back into their specific water supply vs. into some random stream/ocean what not... so really not a big deal.

And like I said, in my parts during big storms, raw sewage does end up getting dumped into the lake due to old infrastructure/combined storm drains. Which is nasty if you swim. But the water is treated before it gets to your tap, so the nasty doesn't go there.

And brewing it into beer cures all!

[BlackDuck]

Back in the day, when nobody cared what was dumped into the water systems, the ending result was this:
http://www.ohiohistorycentral.org/w/Cuy ... e?rec=1642

Remember that Mash????

And Great Lakes Brewing Co. has forever memorialized the event:
https://www.greatlakesbrewing.com/uploa ... 202012.pdf

[Dawg LB Steve]

Unfortunately the Cuyahoga River was immortalized by the comedians of the day for the fire, in reality at that time Cleveland and the Federal Gov't were in the forefront working on what is today the EPA. In the 60's there were many such river fires in the U.S. around main industry heavy cities and many worse river fires. Chanel 25 the PBS station had a documentary on the river about the 50th anniversary and how much the river and the environment has changed from then.

[John Sand]

I'm skipping the middleman and taking my brew water right from the toilet!
Even in a drought, there is never really a water shortage on LI. The glacier water is still down there.

[zorak1066]

sewage treatment / water reclamation is not a new technology/process. Detroit had a sewage treatment plant. the solid matter is separated from the liquid. the solids are fired at an extremely high temp and rendered into commercial grade fertilizers. the liquid then goes through I think a distillation process, which is then chemically treated with cholorine I think... and the result if potable water. not grey water... but potable.

in the Podunk I live now... the bathroom wastes are PIPED via pumping units scattered around town to a separation facility..which then pipes the liquid who knows where as grey water. . the solid is pumped to SPRAY FIELDS where they are converted naturally to organic nitrogen. the HUGE PROBLEMS with this so called technology is a) water run off high in nitrogen is ruining the fragile water table / springs in Wakulla due to algae blooms.. and b) the town reeks of poo anytime they are spraying. I mean it is bad enough that when you drive past a pump station you smell poo.. but to have it concentrated and blasted in your face wherever you go in town??? ya know for a state capital you would expect things to be more like a city and less like a settlement.

the only problems with detroits drinking water that I recall.. is sometimes the plant either put too much or too little chlorine in it. some summers the water stunk of CL.. sometimes of moldy grass. you want to talk gross... in Star Trek NG.. the FOOD is reclaimed solid wastes that is broken down into its individual chemical components and reformed as edible food. I guess it is atomically separated and rebuilt? im not that much of a geek to know. now that would be gross.

[jimjohson]

in Star Trek NG.. the FOOD is reclaimed solid wastes that is broken down into its individual chemical components and reformed as edible food. I guess it is atomically separated and rebuilt? im not that much of a geek to know. now that would be gross.

Replicator technology...they just changed the molecular arraignment of the "bulk material". You can use almost anything, to make almost anything.

[Beer-lord]

Well, all this talk about being treated is well and good but I ask you, DO YOU REALLY TRUST THEM? In a parish south of us, a child died due to the dreaded amoeba in the water supply. Oh, they test it and check it dally they say.
http://abcnews.go.com/Health/brain-eati ... d=25160247

Google it and you'll find it's other places too. Sure, it's just a small amount but once they have a big city with all their shyte they have to treat, I don't want any part of it. But the good news is that treatment technology is getting better so I guess they just might figure this out soon.

[BlackDuck]

Time to brew a Poop Water Pale Ale!!!

[Beer-lord]

Time to brew a Poop Water Pale Ale!!!

Do you have any hop recommendations?