If you need a primer on Water Chemistry please check out Eric’s updated Intro to Brewing Water Presentation from the January 2022 Club Meeting. For more in depth information please refer to the Bru’n Water Knowledge Page.

Special Note: We recommend that all brewers use campden tablets (potassium or sodium metabisulfite) in their brewing water to avoid chlorophenolic off flavours. 1 tablet is designed to treat up to 20 gallons. Toronto uses chloramines in the water treatment process, which cannot be boiled or off-gassed away. We highly recommend campden over carbon filtration for chloramine removal.

Toronto Official Water Report

The City of Toronto publishes the Water Analysis reports rather infrequently (usually Spring of the following calendar year). For reference, here are the most up to date OFFICIAL ion averages from the City of Toronto:

2021 Drinking Water Analysis Summary from this page.

Ion Name	Min (mg/L)	Max (mg/L)	Average (mg/L)
Calcium (Ca)	31.3	34.6	32.8
Magnesium (Mg)	8.0	8.9	8.5
Sodium (Na)	11.6	23.6	14.0
Sulphate (SO4)	21.6	27.8	24.7
Chloride (Cl)	24.2	39.3	27.3
Alkalinity	84.9	105.7	91.3
pH	7.3	7.8	7.5

Latest Toronto Water Results (UNOFFICIAL)

In order to achieved a desired outcome, more up to date numbers are desired. We have reached out to the City of Toronto and received more up to date but *UNOFFICIAL* testing results from the Toronto Water Labratory’s Chief Chemist!

Here are the latest UNOFFICIAL results (R.C.Harris WTP (FHA) – Tested 2020/10/19):
Calcium (Ca) = 33.2 ppm
Magnesium (Mg) = 8.48 ppm
Sodium (Na) = 12.3 ppm
Sulphate (SO4) = 26.5 ppm
Chloride (Cl) = 25.5 ppm
Alkalinity = 88 ppm
pH range: 7.3 pH to 7.46 pH, with an average of 7.38 pH

Here are the latest UNOFFICIAL results (R.L. Clark WTP (FCL) – Tested 2020/10/19):
Calcium (Ca) = 33.5 ppm
Magnesium (Mg) = 8.58 ppm
Sodium (Na) = 12.6 ppm
Sulphate (SO4) = 26 ppm
Chloride (Cl) = 25.6 ppm
Alkalinity = 86.2 ppm
pH range: 7.36 pH to 7.47 pH, with an average of 7.41 pH

Test Data:
XLSX