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German Brewers Warn Fracking Could Hurt Beer
Taco Cowboy writes "Those of you who like free beer, watch out! The practice of fracking for shale gas may ruin the beer you drink. Under the 'Reinheitsgebot,' or German purity law, brewers have to produce beer using only malt, hops, yeast and water. 'The water has to be pure and more than half [of] Germany's brewers have their own wells which are situated outside areas that could be protected under the government's current planned legislation on fracking,' said a Brauer-Bund spokesman. The Brauer-Bund beer association is worried that fracking for shale gas, which involves pumping water and chemicals at high pressure into the ground, could pollute water used for brewing and break a 500-year-old industry rule on water purity."
"it sounded like such a good idea!" ..
Ftw
Cheaper Energy would give a boost to German industry which is especially needed at a time when Europe is middle of a recession just like it has given a boost to the US industry.
The Reinheitsgebot stipulates beer have only THREE ingredients: water, barley and hops. The purity law dates to 1516. Yeast wouldn't be discovered until 1680 and even then wasn't recognized as a living organism.
If you build it, nerds will come. Soylentnews.org
Seriously... People would die if they didn't drink fermented beverages in antiquity.
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
German beer is boring anyways. Get rid of the purity laws and maybe they would catch up to the US and Belgium.
The real pollution problem with fracking for gas isn't the fact that it's fracking as opposed to more traditional extraction techniques, but that the drilling sites are not well monitored and even existing regulations are not well enforced. In other words, the same crap can happen with conventional drilling. It's also ridiculous that thanks to Dick Cheney, companies don't have to tell the EPA or state environmental departments what the ingredients of their fracking fluids are. At least that's the situation here in the US - as an American I can't speak to the German situation so well. Hopefully they handle it better.
I'm afraid that this is yet another industry that'll screw itself through short term greed, just as lax safety at nuke plants has trashed that industry.
So distill the water if you need it "pure". I doubt the water coming out of the ground is as "pure" as distilled water.
I watch way too many WWII documentaries.
We have reverse-osmosis filtering system on the water source for the humidifiers for the environmental chambers in the test lab at work. It's not unknown technology. The old-fashioned alternative is a still.
Are these breweries currently using unfiltered, unpurified water?
All a business is concerned about is profit, and rightly so! If a company doesn't have more money today than it yesterday it can't spend more money today than it did yesterday. Further, if it has less today than it did yesterday it can't spend any without causing risk to those who depend on it making more. Other than investing money only in and accepting the risk for doing so I don't know what else to suggest.
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
Germans are banning nuclear energy and starting fracking?!
Why risk the water supply in such a small and densely populated country?
Oh great, German anti-science deniers spreading scare stories about fracking. It could pollute our beer! Oh noes! No cheap fuel for us! Keep us poor and stupid for our own good!
And slashdot sucks it up.
Well water is anything but pure. In the best case its loader with dissolved minerals and full of microbes. Now admittedly they might be good tasting minerals and microbes, that actually help rather than hinder larger organisms like us that drink but to say its pure is crazy talk.
If the rule is that water has to be pure than they need to be use water that has been made darn near pure via distillation or made by oxidizing hydrogen gas; not pretending well water is pure.
Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
So, let me get this straight: nothing is happening to the beer source water now, and it may well be that nothing will happen to it in the future. And if anything does happen, the magnitude of it could be so small as to be unnoticeable. The only point of the article is somebody's trying to pass or extend the reach of an anti-fracking law/regulation.
This is without a doubt one of the most content-free and pointless articles I've come across on /. in a while...and that's saying something.
In the end they will lay their freedom at our feet and say to us, Make us your slaves, but feed us. - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
I've myself gone to such meetings and it's quite astonishing the kind of utter rubbish that's being peddled as 'fact'. :)
When I get up and ask questions the organisers get nervous and the press interested
But these agitators seem to get away with it, at least for now.
As an example in my town they showed this slide that 'proves' how water is affected.
The scale is so ridiculous I can't imagine why we haven't produced this shallow gas a century ago.
Fact is the shale in my region sits below 3500 m (~10,000ft.)
Above it are huge salt layers that cap the Slochteren formation, the largest but 3/4 depleted on-shore gas field in Europe.
Would there be any leaks from the frack they'd logically end up in this reservoir.
A lady from the public jumped up and cried "Where should we go once our water is polluted", the organisers agreed with her, this crime should be stopped!
In the mean time they 'forget' to mention polluted water is produced at every conventional oil- and gas field, something that in this part of Europe has never been an issue.
But with shale gas it should be?
Thanks Cheney/Bush for fucking up a good idea with irresponsible legislation.
"The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
I'd rather they get all that natural gas out of there that is polluting our water and beer!
Won't somebody think of the beer?! This must stop at once!
We have reverse-osmosis filtering system on the water source for the humidifiers for the environmental chambers in the test lab at work. It's not unknown technology. The old-fashioned alternative is a still.
Are these breweries currently using unfiltered, unpurified water?
As someone who consumes large amounts of beer, there are salts and minerals that exist in the water that come from certain aquifers that are actually desired to be in place for the beer and can have a negative or positive effect on the yeast. An adequate amount of calcium, magnesium, and zinc is necessary for some of the yeast’s metabolic paths. I believe most brewers add in these things to aid the yeast as much or as little as they want but I am almost certain that RO would completely remove any of this out of the water along with anything bad.
This becomes especially apparent when a very large brewery like Anheuser-Busch or SABMiller buys out a smaller brewery like Leinenkugel's and moves production from Wisconsin to Missouri or where ever it is most convenient for their supply lines. Often they keep the same formula, make little adjustments to it and rely on brand loyalty. And as someone who has consumed vast amounts of Leinies in Chippewa Falls, WI and also on the east coast, I can tell you right now that Leinies out here tastes like shit and I'd much prefer Yuengling, Troegs or any of the more local breweries.
And my suspicions are that they take shit water, put it through RO and don't or can't make proper adjustments to add sconnie minerals resulting in an inferior product. Don't get me wrong, I love RO water. I worked at restaurant that only served triple reverse osmosis water and then added some salts and minerals post process and holy hell that was the most refreshing thing I've ever drank. But these breweries are operating on top of hundreds of years of adjustments to their local aquifers and just asking them to insert RO water into their process is probably harder said than done.
My work here is dung.
These are the same people who are now building new coal burning plants because they shut down their nuclear power industry. And the coal they are burning is low quality crap lignite. In some countries in Europe coal consumption is increasing 50% per year.
Some have called it a new golden age of coal in Europe:
http://www.economist.com/news/briefing/21569039-europes-energy-policy-delivers-worst-all-possible-worlds-unwelcome-renaissance
Now of course they are going to turn their back on much cleaner natural gas because they are afraid that they can't write effective regs for shale gas production?
MOAR COAL!!!
Europe's environmental policy is flat out nuts.
Before you beer drinking baboons go on and on about fracking contaminating drinking water, learn about the issues. Water is found at 200 to 600 feet below the surface. Fracking occurs 5,000 to 10,000 feet below the surface. And the pipes that traverse the water table are double/triple insulated and regulated by the environmental agencies.... No threat to your beer water... even your bong water is safe. Move along now... nothing to see.... And why is slashdot even concerned about these issues....sounds like it has been infiltrated by a bunch of hippie douche bags.
Good day.
What about the water? I know it is the national drink in Germany, but they do drink water too, correct?
A lot of money has been raised by the environmental fund raising industry, unfortunately the vogue have done a lot of information damage in doing so.
Democrats have actually politicized the issue to the point where the science is ignored and people are out with pitchforks and torches looking to kill a monster, and anyone who doesn't agree must be pro monster and must also be destroyed.
Are there any cases of water wells being contaminated? No. One well in Wyoming may have been contaminated though the water from that aquifer is extremely deep and nearly in the same zone as the producers in that area and the data-set is likely skewed to arrive at a politically hoped for conclusion the EPA is desperately hoping to construct.
Shallow water wells are notoriously infused with coal-bed methane, to this day I can't believe so many 'educated' people fell for the 'Gas Land' hoax.
People are scared, that is what the environmental money industry wanted and they are really good at it. There are people now who are so convinced 'fracking' is dangerous they are experiencing psychosomatic symptoms such as nose bleeds. And don't forget the lawyers, the lawyers see money and are looking for a big payout.
The beer is safe, what is in danger are the facts.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L4RLzlcox5c
'I don't know what it's called. I just know the sound it makes, when it takes a man's life.' ~ Four Leaf Tayback
If you want to ban fracking in Germany, just give the lawmakers some American beer and remind them that there's fracking in the US and look how the beer tastes.
The purity law says malt, water, yeast and hops are required, but German breweries seem to have been skipping hops recently. It's not beer anymore IMO. Just a malt beverage.
To the german public this is about as scary as saying it will cause maximum speed limits to miraculously appear for all Autobahnen. Saying that fracking will spoil our beer has a real serious tone to it. Bizar, but true, to an extent.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
And now you know why I always bring a case or two of Point Special back with me whenever I get back to WI. The magnesium salts in the local water makes all the difference.
Fracking doesn't change the law! The law still stands. You can (and must) still use pure water. You can use the by-product of exploding chemical hydrogen with chemical oxygen to get absolutely pure water (so pure it would give you the runs if you drank it). Getting water out of a well or some other source is possible too (most of Africa gets water from wells). But they usually consider cleaning impurities from it first, before drinking it. Is the industry merely complaining that they will have to clean the water before use? If so, what did they do if a bird or squirrel accidentally drowned in their well? Make a note that the beer isn't quite as good this year?
I didn't read the summary or the TFA, but everyone knows it's the other way around: consumption of too much beer can ruin fracking. While the consumption of some beer may very well increase desire, reduce inhibitions and can make someone undesirable look very frackable indeed (google "beer goggles"), it is well documented that having too much beer reduces activity and performance and can very much ruin a good frack. In the extreme, having way too much beer will just make you pass out in the middle of fracking, making it prone for you to have the money from your wallet stolen in retribution by the girl that you were with.
As usual, I don't know what the hell the Germans are talking about.
Anyway, all this fracking business reminds me that I haven't seen Battlestar Galactica in a while.
Seems like it's about eight months old. Even crappy big American brews like Budweiser taste better when you're comparing three months vs. eight
German purity laws... Hmm, sound like a Nazi thing. Are the sauerkrauten up to some übermenslishesweltannschauung schutzstaffeln dinge again?
Geeks are so full of shit that "beating the crap out of them" takes a whole new meaning.
What the hell does this have to do with "free" beer? If your article can't stand on its own without sensationalizing it, it probably sucks.
Yeah, it will raise costs but you don't need beer to live.
Now, if the chemicals start affecting tap water or the wells people drink out of, well, mister, them's fightin' words!*
*"Oh, what, cheap energy for all in exchange for drinking poison? I'm flexible." - the unspoken words many in the public are actually thinking but don't dare say.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
Fracking takes place so far below the water table that if they want to protect the purity of their water, all the have to do is place tough standards on how well the fracking wells are lined.
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
Perhaps it was not a good idea to shut down nuclear plants and embark on an unsustainable energy policy that demands increasing purchases of electricity from neighboring countries, and a requisite surge in shale gas development.
I would hope that my ancestral country chooses a more pragmatic approach to help us crack this existential energy problem once and for all instead of castrating itself as an industrial power.
The same thing is happening in the United States, people are jousting one another with windmills.
<blink>down the rabbit hole</blink>
All fracking is not the same.
Bad fracking
1. Shallow wells
2. permeable layers between fracked shale and aquifer
3. Poor handling of fracking chemicals
Good fracking
1. Deep wells
2. Impermeable layer between shale and aquifer
3. Close monitoring of site and disposal of chemicals.
By the way, a similar thing has bee done for decades in oil fields where hot water is injected down one well to increase production on others. The difference with fracking is the chemicals used to create and hold open the cracks so the natural gas can flow.
German beers don't have to do this anymore, so there is no actual worry about getting in trouble.
Lots of German beers don't conform to the very narrow ingredient list anymore and the world is a better place for it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reinheitsgebot#History
Guess we should distill our alcohol. Too bad boiling beer is illegal in most of the world.
We followed the water to British Columbia, but our property turned out to be downstream.
They feared that it could be used to suppress protest or support unpopular rule.
To contaminate our precious bodily fluids.
But hey, almost all american bashing is premised on awful misunderstanding of science. The water that is pumped in during fraking is pumped at very different ground levels (orders of magnitude different) than the levels where accessible underground water reserves are. "Environmental" attacks on fraking are nothing but an attempt to saw confusion around an industry by oil and gas producing nations which don't have the technology. Oh, and no, the process is not simple and releasing it would be an outrageous act of industrial espionage.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
"Remember when I said I'd Frack you last ? I lied"
I KNOW you misunderstand how fracking works. Do you even know what potable water is? Why would there be any need to put potable water into the earth?
Fracking involves pumping a chemical mixture (which is mostly water) with 3-12 chemicals and quartz sand. Or something to that effect.
The rest of your post is not based on knowledge of the fracking industry....just BS. I am not saying you are wrong on it all.
How your post ends up with a 5 score shows the ignorance of the Slashdot crowd as a whole.
I guess the Krauts didn't see that former brewer, now Governor, John Hickenlooper of Colorado drank fracking fluid to show how safe it is. The Euros will do anything to talk themselves out of fracking. Who cares? It is their lights that are dimming from lack of electricity, not ours.
an ill wind that blows no good
Who'd have thought that Battlestar Galactica could have been so prophetic! Fracking frackheads.
My ism, it's full of beliefs.
Does this mean you'll be able to take a match to german beer in the future and have it explode, like American tap water?
One more point to all those that say it ain't gonna happen, just because it "could" happen.. Fact is, it *is* happening, anywhere it could happen. A simple google search will bring up *thousands* of cases of contaminated water tables.
The Lorax and Space Balls are both works FICTION. So is Harry Potter BTW, so don't jump out of a tall building with a broom between your legs thinking you can play Quidditch.
The Reinheitsgebot isn't actually a law as such any more (not since the 90s if i remeber rightly) Various changes have meant that other ingredients are able to be used in German brewing (Weiss beers wouldnt have been possibly under the purity laws) though many of the German brewers still adhere to the restrictions, which creates a very high standard of beer but with very little possible flavour variation.