Does boiling temp affect hops utilization?

[corkybstewart]

As I was brewing an IPA last weekend I had a question I don't think I've asked in my 26 years of brewing. How does boiling temp affect hops utilization? I live at 3100' and the boiling point here is around 203F, not 212F. Does this make any difference as far as hops are concerned? It
s strictly a "for science" issue, I only vaguely measure my hops so I'm not trying to hit an exact number, I'm just curious.

 

[bob1852]

Yes, it does!

There's been a few threads that have described it in greater detail, but I recall that you should be increasing your bittering additons by 10-25%, depending on how high your elevation is.

 

[raysmithtx]

You can find a lot of information on this page. https://alchemyoverlord.wordpress.c...-ibu-measurement-especially-for-late-hopping/. There's alot of really good information there. Can get quite technical but if I read it enough times (I'm not a science/math guy) I can figure it out. Lots of things that we, as homebrewers, never consider. You can see that hops utilization does get impacted by temperature as well as time.

 

[Nebraskan]

I've thought about this for a few days, after a comment elsewhere on using a pressure cooker. Correct me if I am wrong, but boiling hops long to isomerize the hop oils from alpha acids to Iso-Alpha acids is what goes on with long boil times. You can increase hops bitterness, but if it's too long, you can also degrade it. Correct? Also the flavor of hops on long boils does not come though like the aroma and final flavor on doing a late addition hops at near flame out or afterwards doing a dry hops. SO, .... my question following this idea is not to really add 10-15 % more hops, but use hops with more bittering (higher alpha acids) of say 10 to 15 % more alpha in your boil at higher altitudes. Colorado, Wyoming and others in such elevations would be similar.

 

[jheinikel]

Here is a good calculator. Elevation is at the bottom of the form. http://www.straighttothepint.com/ibu-calculator/

 

[ncbrewer]

You can find a lot of information on this page. https://alchemyoverlord.wordpress.c...-ibu-measurement-especially-for-late-hopping/

Also good info on this related website: https://alchemyoverlord.wordpress.com/2016/03/06/an-analysis-of-sub-boiling-hop-utilization/
Table 2 is of particular interest.