The High Cost of Salt and Beer

Even infrequent readers of my blog know that I'm a beer aficionado, so when prices go up I'm going to be affected. But the rice shortage is impacting me too. Not because I'm a huge consumer of rice, but because of its impact on salt. Potassium Chloride salt to be exact.

When my house was built in the early 70's, the builder cut corners. Instead of using standard "L" grade copper pipe, he used "M" grade. The latter is suitable for closed circulating systems (heaters) but not for open systems. I have acidic water. It came up with a pH of 5.5 when I had it tested. Granted, the pH of well water is affected by various conditions, and 5.5 was probably on the extreme end. Anyway, the acidic water slowly ate away at the thinner walled pipe and led to pinhole leaks in my water lines. Fortunately, the way my house is set up, all of the leaking occurred in the garage. The acid would react with the copper pipe closest to the water source. Other than ruining insulation and sheet rock in the ceiling, we avoided any major damage.

Solution: We replaced the accessible copper pipe with flexible plastic pipe (cross-linked Polyethylene) which is unaffected by weak acids. The pH of the ground water would then be neutralized with a water softener/deionizer. Unfortunately, the water softener requires salt. Sodium Chloride is the standard, but I was concerned about introducing excess sodium into our diets so I opted for Potassium Chloride (KCl). Although at $9 for a 40lb bag it was twice the price, the relatively low consumption rate made it worth it.

But that was a few years ago.

Last month, I paid $16 for that same bag at Lowe's. I was in Agway with the kids the other day and I overheard one of the staff explaining to a customer that the price was now $24/bag. Why? China.

95% of KCl produced is used as fertilizer. It's referred to as potash (though the name is a catchall for potassium-based fertilizers). The clerk went on to say that China can't seem to get enough fertilizer for its rice crops (you remember the rice shortage, right?) and its causing a spike in demand for KCl worldwide.

Reminds me of the cement, copper, and steel shortages that were due to China's growth. Anyone seeing a pattern yet?

So, I can either pony up the money for KCl, switch to NaCl and elevate my family's blood pressure, or turn the unit off altogether and hope that my water's low pH doesn't attack the remaining copper pipe in the inaccessible parts of my house. And there's all the talk that acidic water is bad for you (though it doesn't stop people from drinking soda), but I've had a tough time finding unbiased info (most sites are trying to sell you something) on whether or not really weak acids (pH 6) are detrimental. For now, I'll spend the extra money on KCl.

Ok, now for the bad beer news. As I mentioned a couple of months ago, beer prices are going up. Well, if you drink swill, probably not so much. After all, it's so watered down that there's hardly anything in there. But if you're a craft brew drinker, you're looking at higher prices. Anyway, that article explains the situation (quadrupled hops prices! high gas prices! corn ethanol madness!) and offers tips on what you can do to "cope," including brewing your own beer (which I recommend).

Now for the good beer news (didn't want to make this all doom and gloom): the 2008 Connecticut Craft Beer Festival is Saturday, May 17th. I think I've got a 50/50 shot of making it this year. If I do, I'll be sure to report back here with my findings.

Specifically for Mike: Blue Point is now the #50 craft beer maker (in terms of volume) in the country. See this report.

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