Using sulphuric acid in mash water

The HCO3 can be removed or at least much reduced simply by boiling for a few minutes. If you can aereate at the same time that should get rid of the bicarbonate.

 

Why the distinction? (The HCO3 ion is bicarbonate.)

 

I thought I'd elaborate on this recommendation. Boiling is indeed an effective way to reduce bicarbonate. To do this you boil, let the water cool, and then decant the liquid from the solid CaCO_3 that precipitates. It is my understanding that you can remove about 80% of the bicarbonate with this technique (but my memory of the exact percentage may be faulty here). I would recommend doing this step the day before brew day, as it will take some time for 10 gallons or so of water to cool. (I'm assuming you are doing 5 gallon batches.) After this treatment, a reasonable phosphoric or lactic acid addition will probably get you where you need to be. If I were going to do this I would have the boiled/cooled/decanted water tested to see exactly what the results of the process are.

I agree with everybody else here. Your water is way to alkaline to simply treat with acid. And please, stay away from sulphuric! Nasty, nasty stuff.

 

Yes, I realise that. I was trying to avoid using the same word twice in a sentence , of course HCO3 is the chemical formula for bicarbonate.

 

I figured you might know that, being a chemist and all. But it seemed like you were recommending boiling for one and aeration for the other. Are you saying to do both together?

 

Some breweries blow air through the boiling liquor , it apparently assists in removing the CO2 evolved through the breakdown of bicarbonate.The other product is calcium carbonate which being insoluble simply drops out and settles on the bottom.For non chemists, this is exactly what happens in your kettles which "fur up" with calcium carbonate (usually called limescale)
I see I used the word "liquor" to describe water , this is standard brewer speak to distinguish it from water used in washing or cooling.

 

Not to brag but the bicarbonate levels in our (Wrightwood) water is right around 580.
I would not use sulfuric acid at all. I buy distilled water in 2.5 gal containers and build a mineral profile from there. Personally I don't trust the RO stations around here so I have not gone that route. The distilled water ends up being ~12 bucks for a 5 gal batch(thats including all water necessary to brew). A couple extra bucks if I need to mix up a new batch of Starsan.

 

There is plenty of bad well water in VT, e.g. at my lab: 400ppm hardness, 200ppm chloride, 20ppb lead *and* 21ppb uranium. Treatment removes everything but the chloride but we all choose to drink bottled water at work.

Of course we are also blessed with some fantastic water. That was one reason the Alchemist located where they did. Our water here at the house is basically the same as theirs. HF water is similar, but there are wells within 3 miles of them that are horrible. I personally believe that HF water does have some semi-magical undefined quality that contributes to Shaun's beers... but it still took him to take advantage of it.

If you're close to the St. Lawrence river, stick your pipe in there and you'll do pretty well.

 

From what I understand studying articles and the spreadsheet at braukaiser.com, final alkalinity after boiling is less a function of starting alkalinity, and more a function of how much calcium is available to precipitate the CaCO3. Looking at the posted water, a lot of calcium additions would be needed via calcium carbonate or gypsum to maximize alkalinity removal. Then you could remove most of the alkalinity by boiling or lime. One problem is that chloride is already very high, so you may not want to push that much further. You could add gypsum and boost sulfate but then you'd end up with very high chloride and sulfate, low calcium, and fairly low alkalinity. Maybe it would work for you for some styles.