Apparently, it’s pretty good.
Greywater Fresh
If you want a refreshing, environmentally-friendly beverage — but don’t necessarily want to go all the way to Bill Gates’ fecal sludge water route — we might have just the thing.
It’s called the Epic OneWater Brew, and it’s a kölsch-style beer that, according to the Guardian, is made from recycled wastewater.
Crafted as a collaboration between a San Francisco water recycling company called Epic Cleantec and the Northern California-based beermaker Devil’s Canyon Brewing Company, the Epic OneWater Brew was reportedly made from greywater — in short, wastewater from dishes, laundry, and bathroom shower and sinkwater — from a 40-story apartment complex in San Francisco.
“We wanted to do something fun that was going to be an engaging tool to talk to people, to get them excited, but also that showcased the untapped potential of water reuse,” Aaron Tartakovsky, Epic Cleantec’s co-founder and CEO, told the Guardian.
“Drinkable”
Apparently, the beverage is pretty tasty. Matthew Canton, the Guardian writer who tested the beer, described it as “pleasant,” “crisp” and “drinkable,” with “no notes of shower or laundry.” That’s already about ten steps above the might-as-well-be-dishwater that is Keystone Light, so it feels like a win for everyone.
“We wanted to choose a beer that was going to be sort of more universally liked versus some of the more craft beers, like an IPA, that some people like, some people don’t,” he added, speaking to the choice to create a crowd-pleasing kölsch-style beer.
“I think a lot of people… were skeptical about the project or were hesitant to try it,” Tartakovsky told the Guardian, “but I would say 99 percent who came in feeling a little bit apprehensive, once they tried it, got really excited.”
If you might be worried at all about the safety of drinking recycled water, Tartakovsky argues that Epic’s product might actually be safer for consumers than other beers due to the rigorous testing process that they require.
“A lot of times at a brewery, you turn on the tap and whatever water you get, that’s what you brew with,” he continued. “In our case, we have so much control over the treatment process that we were actually able to treat to tweak some of the steps to give the brewers a blank canvas.”
All in all, the Epic OneWater Brew sounds like a creative way to tackle our ever-worsening water crisis. And if we’re all honest with ourselves, most of us could probably say that, when it comes to beer, we’ve likely had worse.