Brewery and Bar Plumbing in Phoenix and the Valley

Phoenix names breweries among the industrial facilities that need an air gap or a reduced pressure (RP) assembly on the water service. Mesa goes further and calls for an RP assembly at breweries, beverage bottling plants, restaurants and convenience stores. The reason is simple: a brewhouse ties the drinking water line to tanks, pumps, glycol loops, hoses and cleaning chemicals, and any of them can push water back toward the street if pressure drops.

A bar that serves food usually falls under the restaurant listing. For anything a list doesn't name, Phoenix lets the Planning and Development Director decide the protection case by case.

Every assembly in Phoenix gets tested at least once a year by a certified tester, and the results go to the city on its forms. Keep the records for three years. Not sure what's on your wall? Here's RPZ vs double check, and the Phoenix Chapter 37 cross-connection rules in full. Phoenix City Code 37-143 also requires any repair of an assembly to be done by a certified repairer following ASSE Standard 5130. HQ tests and certifies domestic backflow assemblies, files results with the city, repairs leaking assemblies and replaces stolen ones. Fire backflow assemblies and fire sprinkler system work are outside what HQ does.

Brewing wastewater is hot, sugary and full of yeast, and cleaning cycles swing it between caustic and acid. Phoenix City Code 28-8 draws hard lines: nothing below pH 5.0 or above 10.5, and nothing hotter than 150°F. It also bans watering a discharge down to meet a limit. Tempe's code sets the same pH and temperature limits and adds that any nondomestic discharge needs a Public Works permit.

Size matters too. Phoenix issues Class A industrial wastewater permits to companies that discharge an average of 25,000 gallons per day of process wastewater, to federally regulated processes, and to anyone whose effluent could affect the treatment plants. Most taprooms never get close to that number. A production brewery should read the Phoenix industrial wastewater permit page before it expands. Phoenix also wants construction drawings for industrial manufacturing facilities reviewed by its Industrial Pretreatment Program before they go to the Planning and Development Department.

What that means for the floor: plan where the hot caustic goes before it hits the drain. Neutralizing and cooling are the brewer's call and the engineer's design. Our part is keeping the drain lines, cleanouts and floor sinks open and sound.

Maricopa County's plan review guide is the rulebook for the front of house. Ware washing sinks, soda fountains, ice machines, ice bins and dipper wells can't tie straight into the drain. Each one drains indirectly through at least a 1-inch air gap above a floor sink. A dump sink in a beverage area needs its own indirect drain line. That's why a good bar has floor sinks under its sinks and ice wells. See floor sink vs floor drain vs mop sink.

Hand sinks go within about 25 feet of every bar and wait station, with no door in between. Glass washers that sanitize with chemicals need a wash solution of at least 120°F, and the county approves NSF glass washers that use iodine at bars. Outdoor bars can't have 2- or 3-compartment ware washing sinks at all; the county limits them to enclosed commercial glass-wash machines.

Opening or remodeling? Start with the county plan review plumbing checklist.

A soda carbonator puts carbon dioxide under pressure right next to your drinking water. Maricopa County's plan review guide sets an ASSE 1022 or other approved device as the minimum protection between the water line and the carbonator. Those devices can't be tested, so if one is the only protection, the county wants a written policy for inspecting it every year. The guide highly recommends a testable reduced pressure (RP) preventer instead, with its relief valve drained through an air gap to a floor sink, and the fittings downstream can't be copper or brass.

Overhead beer and soda lines have to be labeled, and sewer and waste lines can't run above potable water or beverage lines. Worth checking before you hang a new glycol trunk line.

Trench drains are where breweries get into trouble. Inside, they carry wash-down water and spent product to the sewer, so they need grates you can lift, cleanouts you can reach and regular jetting before yeast and grain set up in the line. Outside is different. Phoenix bans stormwater and roof runoff from the sewer unless the city approves it, and only stormwater (with a short list of exceptions) may go to a storm drain. A patio or dock trench drain needs to go where its water is allowed. Serving food too? The restaurant plumbing page covers grease interceptors.

We clear floor drains, trench drains and bar lines with hydro jetting and commercial drain cleaning, camera and repair sewer lines, install and replace water heaters, run gas lines to brew kettles and kitchens, and provide backflow testing, certification, city filing, leak repairs and assembly replacement. We're available 24/7. You get a free estimate and an upfront price before work starts, and we can schedule around brew days and service hours.