How do I explain others that it's okay to have an CO2 bottle in the house? Just have the plastic cap on when it's not in use, have it upright, don't have CO2 bottles next to each other, keep them somewhere where it can't get over 50c, always tighten the bottle when it's not being used.
CO2 safety
- Thread starter chazam
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Making sure the cylinder is secured in an upright position to protect the valve from hitting something, would be a good safety step. You could chain it to a wall, or set in a box that prevents tipping, etc.
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Not to be confrontational, but though you say "explain" it sounds more like you mean; "How do I convince others that it's okay..." In short: You can't. You and I, and probably 99% of this forum know the simple safety requirements that make it fine and dandy to keep a whole shelf of full cylinders indoors, but for people that have absolutely no understanding, nor ever have the need to understand, you've got to come to a compromise with their comfort/anxiety threshold, particularly if they have the say in what comes in or out of the home. Perhaps when this thread fills up a bit more with everyone here giving safety advice or merely expressing incredulity at the notion that there's anything wrong with keeping C02 inside, you can simply hand them this thread to read for themself.
Good Luck.
Good Luck.
pick it up in front of them, hold it upside down, crack the valve a bit....and tell them "see it's a fire extinguisher!"
(tell them your beer is so good, it's on fire! you have to keep putting the flames out!)
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and honestly, when i did a swap once and asked the guy if my tank was actually empty or not, that's exactly what he did to find out.....
it was weird, but even me using co2 for 2 decades, it made ME feel more comfortable....
kinda like in chemistry class at the beggining, having fun pouring acid on your hand...
(you gotta whole minute to rinse it off)
it was weird, but even me using co2 for 2 decades, it made ME feel more comfortable....
kinda like in chemistry class at the beggining, having fun pouring acid on your hand...
(you gotta whole minute to rinse it off)Seriously. Emphasis on “secured.” If you’re not using something like this, you won’t convince anyone it’s safe, because it’s not.
PCABrewing
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I thought your link was to a picture of how yours is secured...
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Ok, so this thread isn't filling up like I thought it would. Perhaps you could simply point out the large (and growing) number of common household kegerators available even at big-box stores...every one of which requires a CO2 tank.
Hmm, maybe cargo belt could work too.
Yeap, there is a bunch of sodastream bottles out there, although they are quarter of the size of a regular 2kg CO2 bottle that I see is common among homebrewers.
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It might surprise some people, but the majority of domestic kegerators are in the homes of people who don't even consider homebrewing, they just buy the BMC brands by the keg for their man-cave, rec-room, to impress their friends or whatever.
hey while we're on the subject, can i screw a chain into the side of a fridge?
that would be a good point...put their mind at ease you're not a gangster to be feared....
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Wait... not a gangster? .. or chain them to the fridge till they relent?
..as long as you know where the coils inside the panels are, you could probably screw chains into the fridge, but a determined person would likely be able to break free.
well we're only talking about a 50 or so pound 'little' person here!
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you should know i don't have any friends, so definitely not a gang? i did once tell someone not to 'smoke' around co2. but i was still a kid, and got a giggle. as kids do. and now i'm paying the price for the giggle, because it trickled down to this thread! not worth it....
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Same way you explain how you need O2 & acetylene for your welding/cutting torch, acetylene B tanks for your gas/air torch, nitro for your HVAC purges, CO2/Argon for the MIG, a little O2 bottle for oxygenating wort when using a re pitched yeast... not the mention the CO2 bottles, one at keg station, one by the fermentor station. and another in reserve.
Keep gas bottles in a safe place and in a way they are secure from being knocked over & secure.
On a side note, my gal thinks CO2 ing the rats she catches in her live traps is better than drowning or a pellet in the head (at least if she is watching). Could use fermentation gas to off the rats w my current set up, but figure that might be bad juju for the beer, so I guess I'll stick to the tanks.
Remember campers, CO2 can be toxic at high concentrations with bad ventilation, but a little common sense will probably keep one safe. And yeah, don't put any tanked gas anywhere hotter than you would want hang out in in, temp wise [(no comments from the sauna folks please {; )] .
What issues does someone else have? Are they specific or just very general (meaning they don't know other than it just *seems* like a bad idea)? That might help with what to do.
jrgtr42
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That's kinda what I was thinking, what are the worries that these people have? That it'll explode spontaneously? leak? stain the carpet?
and what others are we talking about here|? SWMBO? Then you're out of luck, my friend. Other friends and roommates? Downstairs neighbors?
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One could say the same about most heating fuels, HVAC refrigerants, natural gas & propane hook ups.
It is an unsafe world, and even more so for the ignorant. If someone is against ones CO2 tank used for brewing, they are probably really against brewing, cause their cooking gas or EV recharge station is likely more dangerous under some conditions.
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My two 20lb CO2 tanks are stored in the basement and we have a nine-year old kid. The concern is a silent leak or burst disk rupturing when no one is around and the kid walking into toxic level of CO2 in the basement, given the relatively poor ventilation when the fan is off. Of all the things that can happen to a kid, this is a small risk, but I figured she’s worth $500 for a CO2 alarm:
https://www.co2meter.com/collections/fixed-wall-mount/products/remote-co2-storage-safety-dual-alarm
DuncB
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@duncan.brown
True nothing attracts small children better than loud noises and a smoke effects system.
True nothing attracts small children better than loud noises and a smoke effects system.
Every year for her birthday, we get a bouncy castle filled with hydrogen. Oh the humanity!
honestly, i'd buy you one.....
remember that when she's 13-14....
DarrellQ
Well-Known Member
Charging lithium batteries in your home or garage is a much much much bigger problem.
I am a bit surprised no one has yet mentioned the People have been told for decades that CO2 is dangerous and will (is) causing global warming which will destroy our planet sometime in the future. I can see this fear easily transfering to the CO2 bottle in the basement. In their mind, one is as bad as the other. Which is pure nonsense, of course. As has been stated, convincing them of anything else is an uphill battle. Good luck!
Please don't tell those people that fermentation produces CO2...
Or that CO2 is what plants use to make the O2 that keeps us all alive. That's just crazy talk.
NickTheGreat
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Tell them to keep their CO2 hole shut! Quit blowing CO2 in my face!!!
What is coming to the surface of the liqiud is olfactory stimulents. Has nothing to do with CO2 or whatever.
I would've bought the CO2 alarm if I wouldn't have convinced my friend/roommate.
Funnily I got frustrated, ordered a CO2 tank and only after that convinced her saying that "people at this forum thought it was mmkay". No jk, actually I did throw in a few other arguments too.
By the way, if there is 70m^2 of space with the height of 2,5m (so 178,5m^3) and the space is poorly ventilated (not my scenario) and a CO2 bottle of X liters freely leaks into the space, what would be an amount (X liters) that would cause danger? Would two liters do?
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DuncB
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@chazam
180 cubic meters of volume, so 180 x 1000 is 180000 litres of air. Each litre of air has a CO2 concentration of 416 mg/litre.
So 180000 x 0.416 grammes is 74880 grammes of CO2 or 74.88 kg in the room.
Assuming air is dry and cool.
Releasing 2 kg of CO2 from your cylinder into that enclosed space is only going to increase the CO2 from 74.88 to 76.88 ie by about 2.6% overall, or a change of 0.416mg / litre to about 0.4265mg/ litre.
CO2 in the atmosphere has increased from 316 mg / litre in 1959 to 416mg in 2021. So naturally ( thru our actions so not that natural) the CO2 is rising 3x faster year on year than your 2kg escape of CO2.
If it was going to be dangerous for you this CO2 escape you'd be in danger in 4months time from a natural rise in CO2.
This is an approximation, but think it's very ballpark.
If you get the CO2 concentration above 10% in the air then convulsions Coma and death can occur.
1kg of CO2 makes about 554litres of CO2, so 2kg is 1100 litres.
So I think in your sealed dry air cool 180m3 box you'd need 18000 litres of CO2 to get 10% , that would need 16.4 kg of CO2 to be released.
You'll be alright I reckon, however lower concentrations will give air hunger, coordination loss etc.
180 cubic meters of volume, so 180 x 1000 is 180000 litres of air. Each litre of air has a CO2 concentration of 416 mg/litre.
So 180000 x 0.416 grammes is 74880 grammes of CO2 or 74.88 kg in the room.
Assuming air is dry and cool.
Releasing 2 kg of CO2 from your cylinder into that enclosed space is only going to increase the CO2 from 74.88 to 76.88 ie by about 2.6% overall, or a change of 0.416mg / litre to about 0.4265mg/ litre.
CO2 in the atmosphere has increased from 316 mg / litre in 1959 to 416mg in 2021. So naturally ( thru our actions so not that natural) the CO2 is rising 3x faster year on year than your 2kg escape of CO2.
If it was going to be dangerous for you this CO2 escape you'd be in danger in 4months time from a natural rise in CO2.
This is an approximation, but think it's very ballpark.
If you get the CO2 concentration above 10% in the air then convulsions Coma and death can occur.
1kg of CO2 makes about 554litres of CO2, so 2kg is 1100 litres.
So I think in your sealed dry air cool 180m3 box you'd need 18000 litres of CO2 to get 10% , that would need 16.4 kg of CO2 to be released.
You'll be alright I reckon, however lower concentrations will give air hunger, coordination loss etc.
Concentration of CO2 is ~400 ppm by volume. You’ve calculated 400 ppm by weight in liquid water (1 kg/L). So your ~70 kg number is off by a few orders of magnitude.
180000 liters of air at 0.04% by volume means 72 liters of CO2. That’s about 3 mol CO2, which weighs about 120 g.
Google says 40000 ppm is immediately dangerous to life or health; 5000 is the OSHA limit. That’d be 12 kg and 1.5 kg. Your later calculations look correct.
180000 liters of air at 0.04% by volume means 72 liters of CO2. That’s about 3 mol CO2, which weighs about 120 g.
Google says 40000 ppm is immediately dangerous to life or health; 5000 is the OSHA limit. That’d be 12 kg and 1.5 kg. Your later calculations look correct.
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madscientist451
Well-Known Member
Instead of providing an "explanation" of the safety or lack of safety of a CO2 tank, perhaps provide some statistical evidence of causes of accidental death/injury. Motor vehicles are far more dangerous than a CO2 tank.
Then suggest they DWRAHAHB.
Then suggest they DWRAHAHB.
Motor vehicles are more dangerous that most things people do. A quick Google suggests 20 fatalities per year for compressed gases. Compare this to ~400 per year for CO poisoning. But in this comparison consider that nearly every person is exposed to potential hazards from CO, while only a small fraction of people ever work near compressed gases.Instead of providing an "explanation" of the safety or lack of safety of a CO2 tank, perhaps provide some statistical evidence of causes of accidental death/injury. Motor vehicles are far more dangerous than a CO2 tank.
Then suggest they DWRAHAHB.
I think the risk of having cylinders in the house is acceptable, but I wouldn’t tell people to R or DW. Treat them with respect and keep alert to potential problems.
madscientist451
Well-Known Member
I guess my point is that people don't worry about some things that are dangerous, like motor vehicles, but then they are concerned about a CO2 tank, and in my opinion that is kind of ridiculous. Of course, these days anyone with an opinion that points out how ridiculous something is can be labeled as "disrespectful", so I guess I'll tell myself to relax and when its 5pm somewhere I'll get into the homebrew.
