diff --git a/Changelog.md b/Changelog.md
index 34b1ba1..d38d25e 100644
--- a/Changelog.md
+++ b/Changelog.md
@@ -11,6 +11,7 @@
 - complete rewrite of the README
 - add support for creating backups using `pg_basebackup`
 - removed `PG_LOCALE` option (doesn't work!)
+- added `DEBUG` option to enable bash debugging
 
 **9.4-2**
 - added replication options
diff --git a/docker-compose.yml b/docker-compose.yml
index e80c9f7..9ac5f2a 100644
--- a/docker-compose.yml
+++ b/docker-compose.yml
@@ -4,6 +4,7 @@ PostgreSQL:
   ports:
     - "5432:5432"
   environment:
+    - DEBUG=false
     - DB_USER=
     - DB_PASS=
     - DB_NAME=
diff --git a/entrypoint.sh b/entrypoint.sh
index 9bda3fc..a51ae02 100755
--- a/entrypoint.sh
+++ b/entrypoint.sh
@@ -2,6 +2,8 @@
 set -e
 source ${PG_APP_HOME}/functions
 
+[[ ${DEBUG} == true ]] && set -x
+
 # allow arguments to be passed to postgres
 if [[ ${1:0:1} = '-' ]]; then
   EXTRA_ARGS="$@"