German brewers worry fracking will compromise beer quality

German brewers are worried that fracking, the process of extracting natural gas from underground shale deposits, will jeopardize the quality of their beer by contaminating the water supply and have asked their government to hold off on passing the fracking regulations it has been drafting for months.

Germany's Bild newspaper reported Thursday that the country's Brewers Federation sent a letter to six government ministers, including those responsible for health and the environment,asking them to delay the passing of legislation that would regulate hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, saying the law does not adequately protect the water supply their industry relies on.

During the fracking process, a pressurized mix of water, sandand chemicals isinjected into underground shale rock formations or coal beds to release trapped natural gas or sometimes hard-to-reach oil. The techniquehas raised environmental concerns because of the large amount of water that is used, the risk of chemicals andwaste water leaching into the ground and contaminatingground and drinking water, and the large amount of greenhouse gas emissions that are released.

The German brewers say that fracking would violate the 500-year-old "purity law" (known as Reinheitsgebot) that has guaranteed that German beeris made with nothingbut water, hops, malt and yeast.

The integrity of the brewing process, they said,depends on the impeccable quality of the drinking water used, and fracking could jeopardize that. They urged the government to keep debating the issue and do more to safeguard the water supply before pushing through anylegislation.

Beer an important industry

Beer is sacred in Germany, whichis third after Austria and the Czech Republic in consumption of the beverage. The country has about 1,300 breweries, which employ close to 30,000 peopleand produce 100 million hectolitres of beer a year, according to the Brewers Federation.

But the brewers are not the first in Germany to raise concerns about fracking. The Christian Democratic government of Angela Merkel has already delayed the passing of fracking regulations several times and only recently came to a compromise with its coalition partner, the Free Democrats,on where in the country fracking would be allowed.

The German media reported that the government agreed inmid-May to a proposal that would ban fracking in lake catchment areas that are sources of drinking water, butno regulations have been finalized and many doubt they will be before the federal elections in September.

Many Germans, including ministersand other members ofMerkel's owngovernment,remainwary of the practice, and it could be a hot-button issue in the election. Exploratory drilling has already met with protests in North-Rhine Westphalia and Lower Saxony, where much of the shale deposits are located.

For now, there is no moratorium on the practice, meaning the government can technically issue drilling permits for projects that employ fracking, but state authorities have been pushing the federal government to clarify its stance and get regulations on the books.

Shale gas deposits untapped

Fracking has been usedin thedrillingof conventional gas and oil wells in Germany since the 1960s, but the country's shale gas deposits remain largely untapped. Companies like Exxon Mobil Corp. and Germany's own BASF, a global chemicals manufacturer,are eager to start exploiting the resource.

Germany's Federal Institute for Geosciences and Natural Resourceshas estimated that Germany has anywhere from 0.7trillion to 2.3 trillion cubic metres of shale gas thatcould technically be recovered, which is about 30 times Germany's annual consumption of natural gas in 2011, according to U.S. Energy Information Administrationfigures.

Diversifying its energy supply is becoming an increasingly important issue for Germany, which currently imports most of its natural gas from Russia,as the country moves closer to the 2022 end date for phasing out its nuclear power plants.

Europe has been slower to adopt fracking than North America and does not have a European Union-wide agreement on how to regulate the process.

"Europe has 75 per cent of the United States's shale resources, but America is drilling 100 times faster than Europe," British Prime Minister David Cameron told EU leaders earlier this week at a meeting in Brussels on the exploitation of shale gas.