Optimizing Brewing Water Chemistry: A Practical Guide for US Brewers
Technical brewing ingredients and process aids are expertly crafted to enhance both your beer and your brewing operations. In today’s complex brewing landscape, it can be challenging to quantify the benefits of these solutions, but that’s where our comprehensive guide come in.
Understanding Water Chemistry for Brewers
Water chemistry is a critical yet often misunderstood aspect of professional brewing. To help make it accessible, we’ve developed straightforward, easy-to-follow guides tailored for American brewers.
What is Alkalinity?
Alkalinity measures the total amount of substances in water capable of neutralizing acids. In brewing, this buffering capacity plays a vital role in maintaining stable pH levels during key enzymatic processes. Proper alkalinity control directly impacts mash efficiency, flavor development, and overall product quality.
Why Not Just Focus on Hardness?
While water hardness is frequently discussed, it encompasses several components with different effects on brewing. For clarity, we focus on alkalinity in this guide, as understanding and managing it is key to brewing success.
The Source Matters
Water alkalinity varies based on source, geology, and municipal water treatment practices. Breweries in the US often see fluctuations in supply, so regularly measuring alkalinity at your facility is essential. Whether you use municipal or private water, being able to test for alkalinity gives you control over your process.
How to Measure Alkalinity
For most breweries, the easiest way to measure alkalinity is with Palintest tablets. Simply draw a 50 mL sample from your Hot Liquor Tank (HLT), then follow the test instructions.
Treating High Alkalinity—Why Use Acid?
Acid treatment is a popular choice for lowering water alkalinity because it’s cost-effective, straightforward, prevents scale, and allows you to build the ideal ionic profile with salt additions. Our proprietary AMS (Acidic Mineral Solution) blend is specially formulated for brewers, offering several advantages over commodity acids:
- Balanced sulfate and chloride contribution
- Effective at higher dosing rates, without producing off-flavors
- Less expensive than lactic acid
- Won’t interfere with calcium during mashing (unlike phosphoric acid)
- Safe for shipping and handling
Achieve Your Targets
Once you have your alkalinity reading, use the AMS dosage table below to calculate the amount needed for your water. Targeting around 40 ppm alkalinity in your treated water prevents scale in your HLT and gives you a solid base profile. You can then fine-tune your water with dry liquor treatments for each beer style.
Best Practices for Alkalinity Control
- Set a target alkalinity (e.g., 40 ppm)
- Adjust dry treatments based on your recipe
- Define pH targets for each stage (mash, pre-boil, post-boil, final beer—e.g., pH 4.2 ± 0.1 for finished beer)
- Measure alkalinity and pH throughout the process
- Dose with AMS as needed, verifying results with follow-up tests
- Always measure pH at 68°F (20°C) for consistency
- Adjust treatments and pH targets to optimize each beer
Proportional Dosing Made Easy
Automated dosing systems can simplify your workflow, precisely adding AMS to your water supply as tanks fill.
Remember: Water quality may be complex, but water treatment doesn’t have to be. With the right approach, you can brew better beer—batch after batch.