wort chillers as waste of water??

[smakudwn]

i use my pool to chill my wort through a wort chiller. it has a hose hook up on the pump. pump water into the chiller, then dump it back in the pool. heats my pool and cools my wort all in one.

I also do this in the summer.

 

[Pilgarlic]

Message removed - failed to read relevant more current posts.

 

[Anubis]

But water is cheap and renewable.

Not as true as you would think. I worked on a project for a water treatment plant and met with members of the EPA to discuss efficiancy. I was shocked as to how non-renewable water has become. Just with contamination and privitization alone we will be "running dry" by 2035. Watch a documentary or pick up a book, things are never what they seem.

Sorry to be a downer.

I use my waste water to do laundry or to put it in a carboy with oxyclean for cleaning equip. Someone mentioned it already but you want to run the water slowly and just enough to transfer heat. If its running cold, slow it down.

Just my .02

 

[passedpawn]

Someone mentioned it already but you want to run the water slowly and just enough to transfer heat. If its running cold, slow it down.

If you want to reduce water consumption during cooling, just turn off the water and do no-chill.

If you want to have the fastest cooling possible, turn the water all the way on. Heat transfer will happen. Period. And the colder the water is coming out the other end, the greater the cooling ability of the chiller. It is the zeroth law of thermo. I run my water at max and it is (literally) burning hot coming out the other end of my Therminator. Reducing flow is definately NOT an option.

 

[ArtVandelay]

. If you want to have the fastest cooling possible, turn the water all the way on. Heat transfer will happen. Period. And the colder the water is coming out the other end, the greater the cooling ability of the chiller. It is the zeroth law of thermo. I run my water at max and it is (literally) burning hot coming out the other end of my Therminator. Reducing flow is definately NOT an option.

Thank you! someone agreed with me.

 

[markiemark]

Yes. You can use a bunch of it for wash up of your equipment. You can also install rain catchment vessels to help salve your green *ss conscience.....

Too bad we don't get much rain here in SoCal or I would consider a rain catchment. We're pretty much always in a drought here so, yeah, I try to think about ways to save water when I can.

There were some good ideas on this post though that I will try to implement on my next batch.

 

[duskb]

I don't particularly care about wasting water or wasting energy making ice. That wasn't my point at all. I'm refuting the statements from the people who claim they save water by using ice. I'm simply suggesting that ice is not necessarily a MORE eco friendly nor penny pinching alternative to just running straight tap water. Again, I'm not being a hippie here. I personally choose to reuse the waste water from chilling in some additional way because it's easy.

I pay less than a penny per gallon for tap water so when it's cold enough to do the chilling job on its own, I go that route. That's 30 cents to chill a 6 gallon batch. If you do this with ice, it will require about 40 pounds and I think that it's going to cost more than 30 cents to make it or buy it.

Maybe I'm misinterpreting your point here. I do the ice thing quite regularly and it works pretty well to bring the temps down with minimal waste. I can't say I burn more than 3 gallons of water when I cool a batch. Most of that gets dumped on the plants.

To clarify, a few frozen 2 liter PET bottles are renewable, waste no water, and aid in quick chill. If you plan well those bottles can be frozen inside of a day and whatever energy is burned has to be minimal, especially compared to the rates DWP is charging out here for H2O.

 

[PartyBible]

water the yard....