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No, Stone Brewing doesn’t brew with reclaimed water. (Yet.)

No good deed (or idea) goes unpunished.

If you haven’t figured it out, that beautiful glass of beer you constantly long for is mostly water. As you can imagine, clean water is a vital part of the brewing process. That’s why so many breweries partner with water conservation efforts. Stone Brewing is just as conscious of the need for clean water, prompting them to brew a Stone Full Circle Pale Ale, using purified reclaimed water.

The beer was brewed for a private event promoting Pure Water San Diego, on tap for a few hours. Maybe the future isn’t now just yet. Not all of Stone Brewing’s fans warmed to the thought of reclaimed, purified water being the backbone of their beer’s makeup.

Let’s set the record straight. First, this one off batch of beer is the only beer in the brewery’s lineup that used reclaimed water. It is no longer available. None of the beer you’ve had from Stone uses reclaimed water, nor will they in the foreseeable future. Despite the upside using reclaimed water has on the environment, especially a drought stricken Southern California, the city of San Diego isn’t ready yet.

What Stone Brewing learned. 

The reclaimed water was actually cleaner than normal tap water. On a molecular level, the reclaimed water is better water than what flows out of your shower head. The downside? Mentality. It seems drinkers need a little more time to adjust to the idea reused sewer water. There is still an “icky” factor for some.

The safe and proven technology is intended to replace up to a third of San Diego’s water with recycled water by 2035. This puts San Diego solidly in the middle of the pack. Using this technology is nothing new. It’s used by regions all over the US, and all over the world. Don’t worry, journalists using creative-yet-largely-inaccurate headlines and made-up facts in news reports also places them solidly in the middle of the pack as well. LOL (again). Sad (the standard of our national discourse…but that’s another story!).

In the meantime, Stone Brewing’s water used in the brewing process is the same as it’s always been. The city of San Diego hopes to replace up to one-third of the city’s drinking water with reclaimed water technology by 2035, or sooner – if Stone has anything to say about it.

That give’s the brewery’s fans a little more time to adjust to the idea of reclaimed water – in all it’s sustainable glory.