Easy cleanup for small batches
- Thread starter robbinstw
- Start date
Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:
smata67
Well-Known Member
Do you have any idea how many dolphins gave their lives so you can suck down 14 bombers? Well, probably none, but that's not the point. You are destroying the planet, MAN! Get with the program!
Actually... if he is already using the water from the containers to brew and or drink, then he is REUSING the product before disposing (either trash or recycle). So i think it could be thought of as clever and pro- environment.
Recycling plastic might not be actually recycling. With China and India no longer taking much of our collected recyclables, I think most of it these days is going into landfills anyway. At least one town here in Florida has stopped collecting recyclables altogether.
(I apologize but i am about to go on a tear below. Something just did not sit right with me)
And while we are on it....
Let's talk about all the propane burned in home brewing. (Yes its cleaner but still contributes air pollution).
Also lets talk about the extra disel fuel burned transporting the propane to your local distributor. Or worse the exchange tanks which only come about 75% full.
Then lets talk about the water most of us waste in the cooling process.
Or how about the caustic chemicals used in cleaning that end up down the drain?
Yes a lot of folks will do things during some of the above steps to save (maybe electric vs. Propane, or maybe recycle cooling water) but the bottom line is almost all of us in someway contribute "bad waste" to this planet by home brewing. He who casts the first stone or galss houses... pick your metaphor.
Props to the OP @robbinstw for finding a use for what is likely the same jugs he gets water for brewing that originally just went in some bin before.
Not trying to be a jerk or throw shade but come on... we all contribute waste somehow. Lets not castigate a guy who may have a good idea. I want to know more about his idea.
Did it get contaninated? Did it work? Was it faster? Would he do it again?
And while we are on it....
Let's talk about all the propane burned in home brewing. (Yes its cleaner but still contributes air pollution).
Also lets talk about the extra disel fuel burned transporting the propane to your local distributor. Or worse the exchange tanks which only come about 75% full.
Then lets talk about the water most of us waste in the cooling process.
Or how about the caustic chemicals used in cleaning that end up down the drain?
Yes a lot of folks will do things during some of the above steps to save (maybe electric vs. Propane, or maybe recycle cooling water) but the bottom line is almost all of us in someway contribute "bad waste" to this planet by home brewing. He who casts the first stone or galss houses... pick your metaphor.
Props to the OP @robbinstw for finding a use for what is likely the same jugs he gets water for brewing that originally just went in some bin before.
Not trying to be a jerk or throw shade but come on... we all contribute waste somehow. Lets not castigate a guy who may have a good idea. I want to know more about his idea.
Did it get contaninated? Did it work? Was it faster? Would he do it again?
brewbama
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- Sep 20, 2013
- Messages
- 3,740
- Reaction score
- 2,519
Lots can be done. Maybe there’s more:
Use electric induction cooktop.
Use biodegradable cleaner (B-Bright).
Use Iodophor and simply let it dissipate— use resulting water on landscaping or garden.
Clean with hot water from chiller.
Feed wildlife or pets with spent grain.
Use CO2 from fermenter to purge keg.
Use CO2 from spund to carbonate.
If you buy water, buy bulk containers like this gentleman did vs several individual containers.
smata67
Well-Known Member
One positive is that you can continue to brew with the same container for 450 years. Now, that's a lot beer!
Steven Barrett
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- Jul 11, 2019
- Messages
- 162
- Reaction score
- 49
We should all be aware of the impact that each action we take has on our planet, from homebrewing, to starting your car, to buying something from Amazon, and we should all take steps to improve.
Whether China/India/wherever still recycles our plastic is irrelevant. The end result would be the same: the container at some point gets tossed. OP is gleaning one more use out of an otherwise thrown-out container, and that's commendable. Maybe it could be used one more time. Rinse out and use to store Starsan, etc.
Some of the other posters have good points, in that our hobby does have an impact and does use resources. Whether or not those resources are deemed "wasteful" is in the eye of the beholder, but we can be creative and find ways to reuse things, use less water, etc. With my last brew I filled six 5-gallon buckets with effluent water from my immersion chiller. The first 2 buckets were hot enough to use as wash water for my kettle. The rest watered trees in my yard.
Some of the other posters have good points, in that our hobby does have an impact and does use resources. Whether or not those resources are deemed "wasteful" is in the eye of the beholder, but we can be creative and find ways to reuse things, use less water, etc. With my last brew I filled six 5-gallon buckets with effluent water from my immersion chiller. The first 2 buckets were hot enough to use as wash water for my kettle. The rest watered trees in my yard.
Agreed.. I noted that China in particular was not buying our refuse for recycling so it is likely that it is getting landfill disposal even if you think it is getting recycled.
So, less use of plastics is advisable, reuse or re-purposing should be thought about as much as possible. This also goes to not wasting water, limiting other waste, composting or other use of spent grain, all little things help.
The OP is re-using just once then throwing it away to avoid cleaning. To my mind, it is commendable to find another use and not so commendable for just tossing it to avoid cleaning.
smata67
Well-Known Member
Out here in the southeast, we have a greater appreciation for gaseous discharges from the FRONT end of the bovine, rather than the rear, like you Westies. Except, of course, when it comes to voting in presidential elections, in which we exhibit a very STRONG predilection for candidates enjoying the posterior discharges. In fact, we occasionally have to pop their heads out of bovine posteriors during campaign travel for their own safety to prevent asphyxiation. We tend to be discreet about this, so you more educated members of our great nation probably haven’t heard of this practice. But rest assured, it happens and it is not pretty.
smata67
Well-Known Member
I was out today looking for these 2+ gallon containers and no luck (did not try Walmart, though). Seems all that is commonly available now are 1 gallon in size, a bit on the small size for batch splitting, but I got a few and will be pitching different yeasts into a common wort on my next batch.
smata67
Well-Known Member
I'll have to check them out. For those 2.5 containers, it might be a good idea to build a jig to hold them, I might just do that. I picked up some 1 gal jugs from DG, these bottles are PET, fairly sturdy, and even have a hump to help in racking.
Nobody is perfect for our planet, or our use of resources. Even those using electric brewing methods may not be pollution-free. Where did that electricity come from? Coal-fired power plant? And even using hydroelectric wasn't without environmental cost. What happens to all the vegetation that is drowned by a new hydroelectric facility? It eventually decomposes, creating methane which is 25x worse than CO2 as a greenhouse gas.
And buying a nice hybrid--how much emergy (embodied energy) went into making that hybird? A lot.
Resources get used as long as the price/cost are low enough that the price doesn't dissuade us. If gasoline prices rose (here in the US) to $8 a gallon, who'd still be driving pickup trucks just because? At $8/gallon most of us would be looking for ways to reduce our consumption, via hybrids, electric cars, walking more, biking, moving closer to work, carpooling, telecommuting, etc. And we would reduce that consumption.
The one sure-fire way to reduce consumption of anything--energy, resources, whatever--is to raise the price. Only in cases where people don't have an alternative (life-saving drug, e.g.) will the consumption prove inelastic.
I teach in this area (sustainability and renewable energy) and I know a fair amount about this. I look at the choices, the alternatives, that I have, and I just want to throw up my hands at times. It's COMPLICATED, and even people who think they're doing the planet a favor by buying a hybrid usually aren't considering the embedded energy in making it, the source of the electricity used to charge it, and the end-of-life-cycle costs to scrap a new car versus running an old one into the ground.
So I just do the best I can. I'm not Simon-pure in all this. I do what I can. I give my spent grain to a friend who has chickens. But I drive it over there. If I can, I do it while on my way to someplace else.
*******
All this is why I've concluded the only good way for us to address these issues is PRICE. You might think you can figure out the carbon footprint of your lifestyle, but the odds are incredibly high that you have not, and cannot. And to those who think the government can mandate all this at a micro level...well, the government does almost nothing well, so relying on that as a source of environmental policy, at a coherent level.....not the best choice.
But if you price resources higher, people will make their own choices. We don't need the government to tell us what to do--price will tell us that. And most of us will make individual decisions designed to maximize, i.e., to get the most bang for our buck. Sometimes we'll be wrong about what the right choices are, but when prices rise...people use less. Less gasoline, fewer material resources....
********
Anybody who wants to do a deep dive into this, look up the Thomas Theorem. And Jevons' Paradox.
And buying a nice hybrid--how much emergy (embodied energy) went into making that hybird? A lot.
Resources get used as long as the price/cost are low enough that the price doesn't dissuade us. If gasoline prices rose (here in the US) to $8 a gallon, who'd still be driving pickup trucks just because? At $8/gallon most of us would be looking for ways to reduce our consumption, via hybrids, electric cars, walking more, biking, moving closer to work, carpooling, telecommuting, etc. And we would reduce that consumption.
The one sure-fire way to reduce consumption of anything--energy, resources, whatever--is to raise the price. Only in cases where people don't have an alternative (life-saving drug, e.g.) will the consumption prove inelastic.
I teach in this area (sustainability and renewable energy) and I know a fair amount about this. I look at the choices, the alternatives, that I have, and I just want to throw up my hands at times. It's COMPLICATED, and even people who think they're doing the planet a favor by buying a hybrid usually aren't considering the embedded energy in making it, the source of the electricity used to charge it, and the end-of-life-cycle costs to scrap a new car versus running an old one into the ground.
So I just do the best I can. I'm not Simon-pure in all this. I do what I can. I give my spent grain to a friend who has chickens. But I drive it over there. If I can, I do it while on my way to someplace else.
*******
All this is why I've concluded the only good way for us to address these issues is PRICE. You might think you can figure out the carbon footprint of your lifestyle, but the odds are incredibly high that you have not, and cannot. And to those who think the government can mandate all this at a micro level...well, the government does almost nothing well, so relying on that as a source of environmental policy, at a coherent level.....not the best choice.
But if you price resources higher, people will make their own choices. We don't need the government to tell us what to do--price will tell us that. And most of us will make individual decisions designed to maximize, i.e., to get the most bang for our buck. Sometimes we'll be wrong about what the right choices are, but when prices rise...people use less. Less gasoline, fewer material resources....
********
Anybody who wants to do a deep dive into this, look up the Thomas Theorem. And Jevons' Paradox.
Tesla is, in reality, a coal powered car.
What happebs to the batteries? Does the chemical waste off-set the potential for air poolution from a modern 4 cylnader car?
On todays cars, one will die of starvation before fumes if you try to commit suicide by running it in a closed garage.
It is SO complicated. I recently visited a love one in the hopsital. They no longer carried plastic staws in the cafeteria (because of the report by a 3rd grader that went "viral") yet evey single pill given was individually wrapped in plastic. Seriously.
To be fair, he was a very smart 3rd grader.
Challenge accepted!!
I’m currently in a garage with the motor running and I think you
may have been
wron....
I must apologize for not responding to all these posts.
Thanks for all the interest.
1. The beer came out fine: no contamination that I could detect.
2. I must confess to being wasteful of plastic; in the confines of a small post-retirement condo, cleaning a five gallon tub is going to be an extremely messy operation.
Thanks for all the interest.
1. The beer came out fine: no contamination that I could detect.
2. I must confess to being wasteful of plastic; in the confines of a small post-retirement condo, cleaning a five gallon tub is going to be an extremely messy operation.
That's awesome man!!
I don't think you need to sweat the plastic waste... sounds like you did in fact recycle, reduce, reuse!!
A lot of home brewers use distilled water as the water source. These usually come in 1 to 5 gallon sizes. Sounds like you found a handy way to reuse them!
smata67
Well-Known Member
The OP's containers are HDPE. I don't like how easy it is to squeeze. I'm looking for some alternative containers in PET at usplastic.com.
