Salt Lake water report

I finally found my water report. I am looking for feedback on treating it if necessary. We have added fluoride. I apologize for the low tech post. I use a simple program for my recipe calculations. Our water is Big Cottonwood and Jordan Valley (2nd and 5th columns).
Let me know if you can't read it.
Hardness as CaCo3 188ppm
Calcium 47.9 ppm
Chloride 22
Alkalinity 144 ppm
Fluoride 673

Your water has pretty high alkalinity. For brewing, high alkalinity means a higher mash pH, all other things being equal. Depending on your grain bill and other minerals, this may not be an issue. I recommend downloading Palmer's EZ water or the Bru'N water spreadsheet to get an idea of estimated mash pHs for all grain brewing.

The most important thing to do with municipal water is to remove the chlorine or chloramine. Hopefully the report lists which is used and you can treat your water appropriately. Removing chlorine is very important to making good beers, both in all-grain and extract brewing. Yeast metabolise chlorine into weird off flavors that give your beer a plastic, vinyl, or medicinal taste.

I don't think brewers usually worry about the fluoride.

The report just says chloride. Is this something tbat boils off or is an additive needed? And if so what would be used?

Chloride is a mineral and an electrolyte. It is different than chlorine which a chemical often used by water districts to treat water, and I believe help to clean the water pipes. If the water report does not mention chlorine, you should contact the water district and find out if they use chlorine or chloromine.

You mentioned earlier that your tap water comes from two different sources. I'd find out the time of year each source is used as well.

Yeah, that water is a little hard and alkaline. The alkalinity will require neutralization for most brewing. The other ions are at very modest levels. Its a decent brewing water. Don't worry about the fluoride, its reported in ppb units so its actually 0.67 ppm. No big deal.

Winter it is Jordan Valley. The rest of the time it is Big Cottonwood. I went on Bru'n Water. I hate to admit it is a bit more complicated than I want to get into. I had some trouble of with my download. I use a Ipad. I will try to find out exactly between the 2 chemicals. If it is chlorine is it fixable?

EZ water, as the name implies, is easier to use.

Yes, both chlorine and chloromine are fixable. Plenty of info on hbt about removing the two. There's campden tablets, pre boiling, letting the water sit, plus spring water and reverse osmosis water options.

mabrungard said:

Yeah, that water is a little hard and alkaline. The alkalinity will require neutralization for most brewing. The other ions are at very modest levels. Its a decent brewing water. Don't worry about the fluoride, its reported in ppb units so its actually 0.67 ppm. No big deal.

Click to expand...

Thanks, I can figure what to do with hard water. I put some info into my beer calculator although it was confusing I can work through it.

Pie_Man said:

Yes, both chlorine and chloromine are fixable. Plenty of info on hbt about removing the two.

Click to expand...

Info right here in the Brew Science Stickies.