Hazards in the Homebrewery

Part of my responsibility during my day job is to keep an eye on folks in a research environment and to make sure everyone is doing their jobs safely. I often times find my role of keeping an eye on folks at work bleeding over to my family and personal life. I often see things or situations that are a bit risky and dangerous. This blog was sparked because Wick had a minor accident with a brew hauler and it made me think it was time to remind folks that homebrewing has some risks. Some hazards can cause bodily injuries, damage personal belongings, or ruin your brewday.

Every hobby has their inherent risks. Homebrewing is no different and the hazards range from mundane to potentially life threatening. In this post I will discuss some of the most common hazards you might encounter as a homebrewer. I will go also into detail a little about how to negate these hazards. The goal of this post is to not scare folks, but to remind folks that this hobby does have some hazards. Injuries are rare in homebrewing, but accidents do happen on occasion and it’s best to avoid or at least prepare for them. This post might be a little on the long side, but I feel this topic is important and should be shared. Please share this post with your fellow homebrewers.

Hot Surface and Liquids

Whether you are an all-grain or an extract brewer, you will have no choice but to deal with hot surfaces and boiling liquids.  From my experience, burns are the most common type of injury in the home-brewery. Having to boil your wort has its risks. First, surfaces exceeding 140° F can produce second degree burns in approximately three seconds and third degree burns in five seconds of contact. This is usually enough time let go if it’s something you picked up or touched. However, if you were splashed by a hot liquid and it saturated your clothes, it might take a few seconds for you to remove your clothes and an injury can occur. The highest potential for burn injuries is during the boil. The surface of your kettle and the wort inside is at least at 212° F, potentialy higher depending on the sugar concentration. At this temperature, third degree burns are almost immediate if you are splashed with wort or if you touch the kettle or burner.

So, how do you go about avoiding burns? First, plan a head and be contentious of your brewing area. Be sure children and pets are clear of your brew kettle, all of your hoses and connections are secure and leak free, and you have heat and water proof gloves on hand.  Never stick your face down inside your kettle while you’re boiling. I know, this is really tempting, especially during hop additions, but a burn to the face or eye is never fun. Never move containers (pots, mash tons, hot liquor tanks, etc.) when they are full of hot liquid and never pour large quantities of hot water from one container to another; transferring hot liquids in this fashion opens you up to spilling or splashing hazards. It’s always better to plan a head and either use a pump to transfer liquids or use some kind of tiered brewing setup. When picking up anything hot, wear your heat and water proof gloves.

Fire and Electrical Hazards

Brewing with propane, natural gas, or even electricity, all pose their own their own hazards.

When brewing with natural gas or propane, always make sure your connections are tight and are not leaking. Check your surroundings and make sure you have nothing combustible near your brewing equipment. If you smell propane or rotten eggs (ethyl mercaptan), stop brewing immediately and be sure all of your connections are properly sealed and everything is functioning properly. If you are using natural gas, I recommend calling your gas provider immediately.

In the event of a fire, there is one tool everyone one should have in their home, and that is a fire extinguisher. I keep one in my house and one in my garage. Be sure your extinguisher is charged by looking at the gauge on the bottle. Replace your extinguishers if the needle on the gauge is ever outside of the green area. Check your extinguishers at least once a year, preferable more frequently. Also, read the instructions on your fire extinguisher so you know how to operate it in the event of an emergency.

Carbon monoxide poisoning is another hazard when brewing with propane or natural gas. Carbon monoxide is an odorless, tasteless, and colorless gas that can potentially kill you. Carbon monoxide is formed by the combustion of hydrocarbons. Carbon monoxide bonds with hemoglobin in your blood, keeping oxygen from bonding with hemoglobin, slowly suffocating you. Use your brewing systems in well ventilated areas. If brewing in your garage, be sure to always keep your garage door at least a foot open. It would be better to just leave the door wide open. Natural gas is a relatively clean source of heat compared to propane if all components of your burner are functioning properly. However, if your natural gas equipment hasn’t been maintained, you run the risk of generating carbon monoxide. And finally, when it comes to carbon monoxide, if you brew in a confined space (even your garage) or if you have natural gas appliances in your home, I very highly recommend purchasing a carbon monoxide detector. One for your brewery and one for somewhere in your home. A carbon monoxide detector saved my family’s last year when our heater decided to eat itself. Everything with our heater seemed to function correctly, we were getting heat, wasn’t making any weird sounds, no off of burning smells, but our detector said otherwise. An inspection the next day by an HVAC specialist found that our heat exchanger was leaking carbon monoxide into our home. Get a carbon monoxide detector, even if you’re brewing in your garage. Seriously, if you have anything in your house that uses natural gas or propane, get a carbon monoxide detector. According to the CDC, an average of 430 people die each year in the U.S. due to carbon monoxide poisoning.

It seems like at some point homebrewers end up involving electricity into their brewing process. Wither it be for pumps or for heating elements. Mixing liquids and electricity doesn’t always mix. Make sure you are always working with a circuit that has a ground-fault circuit interupter (GFCI). A GFCI will protect you if electricity ever decides to find it’s way through your body. If your brewing area doesn’t have a GFCI build into the circuitry, a plug in GFCI can be purchased relatively cheaply.

Wet Floors and Heavy Lifting

It’s natural for a brewing area to get wet during a brewday. It’s not uncommon for me to spray down my brewing area through out the brewday to keep any sticky gooey wort from making a harder mess to clean up later. I have never slipped or fallen while brewing in my garage, but I know the hazard is there. When your work area floors are wet, you should be wearing shoes that are anti-slip. The best way to avoid slipping hazards is to not get your brewing area wet in the first place. However, no matter how hard to keep things dry, spills do occure. I use a large floor squeegee to push any water out of my garage to help the floors dry more quickly. Using a mop would also work. Under no circumstances should you ever pick up heavy items while your floors are wet, especially if you are carrying hot liquids or carboys.

I can’t tell you how many times I have picked up a full 80+ pound mash tun off the ground to put on a table. I know just about every other homebrewer has done the same thing. Picking up containers full of liquid that can easily burn you isn’t a smart move, but most of us are guilty of having done it. Picking up heavy items in general has its own hazards. First, plan your brewday in such away that it doesn’t require you pick up anything heavier than your grains. Avoid picking up heavy items and trying to place them on surfaces higher than your chest (I’m looking at you guys with the 3-tier brew systems). The best way to avoid having to pick up anything during your brew is to use a pump. I know they are a little on the expensive side, but a pump will drastically improve the safety of your brew system and it will also keep you from getting so worn out during your brew day. If you do have to puck up heavy items, lift with your knees and not your back.

Chemical Hazards

A lot of people don’t really think about some of the chemicals used in the homebrewery being hazardous. Chemicals such as PBW, Starsan, or Oxyclean all have their individual risks (every chemical has their own potential hazards). Without knowing what chemicals you are using in your homebrewery, I really can’t give specifics on your hazards. However, I do recommend you identify what chemicals you are using your homebrewery and track down the material safety data sheets (MSDS or SDS) for the chemicals you are using. Read these MSDS and ready about the associated hazards and what to do if you are exposed to these chemicals, such as eye or skin contact, while brewing. I have provided links to the MSDS for the most commonly used chemicals found in a homebrewery:

• Professional Brewery Wash (PBW)
• Oxyclean
• Starsan
• BLC Beverage System Cleaner
• One Step No Rinse Cleaner
• Saniclean
• IO-Star

I do know from experience that some of these chemicals will have an effect on your skin. I know PBW and Oxyclean make my skin feel slippery when wet and then extremely dry afterwards. I always rinse my hands and arms very well after I come in contact with these chemicals, but my skin always feels weird for a few hours after a brew day. I highly recommend using disposable or reusable nitrile gloves when washing your brewing equipment, not only from a safety perspective, but also from a comfort perspective.

Also, consider looking at MSDS for carbon dioxide if you are kegging, oxygen if you use pure oxygen to oxygenate your wort, and nitrogen if you use nitro on your kegging system.

Compressed Gasses, Bottle Bombs, and Glass Carboys

A lot of homebrewers eventually move onto kegging their beers from bottling. Most homebrewers will use 5 or 20 pound carbon dioxide tanks to force carbonate and then push their beers. These tanks are relatively safe, but like everything else in this post, do have some associated hazards. If you are using compressed carbon dioxide, oxygen, nitrogen or any other gas stored in compressed gas cylinders, please be careful when handling, transporting, or using these tanks. Always keep the bottles physically secured (when putting mine in my car, I like to use a seat belt to keep the tank from moving around) to keep the heads/valve from being accidentally knocked off the tank. In the event of a tank losing it’s head, it can potentially turn into a rocket, iterally. Here is one of those cheesy videos employers like to show folks during compressed gas cylinder training.

When fermenting anything in completely closed containers such as bottles, there’s a risk of bottles exploding. Exploding bottles aren’t dangerous unless you are standing next to one or one explodes in your hands. Bottle bombs are not uncommon in the homebrewery. Bottle bombs occur when someone doesn’t let a beer completely ferment out before bottling, added too much priming sugar, or their beers have an infection and fermentation continues in the bottle until the bottles can no longer handle the pressure and they explode. Be sure your beer is fully fermented out before bottling and you always follow good sanitation procedures.

What’s really scary, this problem can happen with fermenters  and kegs too. On several occasions I have had lids of buckets be blown off from clogged air locks. I have had clogged air locks on glass carboys. I have heard of some homebrewers having glass carboys explode. I have recently had a run in with a sweet stout I thought was finished fermenting that contained a strain of WLP644, bruxellensis, but three months later my keg decided to have a blow out. The video is below. I lost about 1.5 gallons of beer from this goof. However, the pressure relief valve automatically vents around 50-60 psi, and I just happened to be home when I hear the valve start to to vent and I was able to drag the keg outside before it made an absolute mess in my house.

And the discussion brings me to why I started this post: glass carboys. I honestly think glass carboys are the most hazardous and dangerous items in the homebrewing hobby. Wick was moving one of his carboys using a brew hauler when one of the handles broke off the hauler. Luckily, Wick has the reflex of a mongoose and was able to save his carboy from falling to the ground. Glass carboys are heavy, bulky, slippery when wet, can easily chipped or cracked, and shatter when dropped. Over the years I have heard of dropped carboys not just shattering, but exploding (I’m assuming from residual stresses from when the carboy was manufactured, kind of like a Prince Rupert’s Drop), causing deep lacerations or embedding glass shards in walls.

When it comes to handling carboys, never handle them while they are wet. Always use something like a milk crate when transporting carboys. Do not use re-purposed milk crates or milk crates that have been left out in the sun as UV light can damage the structural integrity of the polypropylene. New milk crates are relatively cheap. If you plan on using milk crates, place the carboys in the crates while they are empty. Placing a full carboy into a milk crate is asking for a broken carboy. I normally use brew haulers to move my full glass carboys around, but after Wick’s incident and hearing about other people on forums having similar issues, I am hesitant on using brew haulers anymore.  Brew haulers are also made out of polypropylene, so these can degrade over time from exposure to sunlight too. Also, never use the carboy handles the attach at the neck. Those handles are designed to be used on empty carboys.

For safety reasons, I have started phasing glass carboys out of my homebrewery. Over the years I transitioned from using buckets to carboys just because buckets need to be replaced periodically. However, recently I have started to feel that carboys are just too dangerous to have around, so I have phased out most of my glass carboys and replaced them with standard brewing buckets or the SS brew buckets. I have gone from seven glass carboys to two and I only keep these two carboys around for sour ales.

Brewing Under the Influence

I’ll admit it, I have done my fair share of brewing while buzzed. I have never brewed while completely smashed, but I have brewed while slightly impaired. While I have never had a serious accident or injury while brewing; I can tell you I have at least screwed up my hopping additions, forgot my whirlfloc, or forgot to stop my boil. For me, it seems natural to want to have a homebrew while brewing. However, having one too many and brewing while drunk is extremely dangerous. All of the hazards mentioned above are amplified because of inebriation. Your reaction times are slower, your reasoning skills are handicapped, and your motor skills are impaired. When brewing, please drink responsibly and limit your intake until after your brewday has finished. And I feel obligated to remind folks to do not drink and drive. Drinking and driving is just dumb, so don’t do it.

Apparel and Environmental Conditions

Anyone who lives in our area can tell you the summer months around here sucks, like really really sucks. In July/August it can easily reach 110+° F in my garage when I’m at a full boil and if there is no breeze (in my neck of the woods, there is no breeze in the summer) and the heat and humidity from the kettle just makes it unbearable. When brewing it’s important to take weather considerations into account when it comes to safety. I have had several brewdays where I have had the life sucked out of me from dehydration and heat while brewing. And folks who brew in the north, well brewing in the winter can also be dangerous.  Adjust what you wear during brewday to account for weather conditions. However, during the summer months, there’s only so much clothing you can take off before your neighbors call the cops. I know this section seems silly to talk about and most folks know how to work outside in their local climates, but I just wanted to remind folks that brewing during extreme heat or cold can be risky.

My last piece of advice has to do with footwear while brewing. I am very guilty of brewing while barefoot, especially when it’s balls-ass-hot outside. I have left ball valves open while transferring wort or water from one vessel to another and have had hot liquid splashed all over my feet, not fun. Brewing while barefoot is also dangerous as it increases the risk for slipping. While brewing I highly recommend folks wear closed-toed shoes while brewing. This will help reduce the chance of burning the crap out of your feet but will also keep you from slipping and falling during a brewday.

Anyways, this blog post was stupid long, but I hope it has helped to remind folks that while homebrewing is a relatively safe hobby that it still has some risks you need to consider. If you have any input on this post or feel that I have missed something really important, please let us know by commenting below or shooting one of us an e-mail.

Cheers,

Ron