First of all some contact details for people who wanna chase up info of their own.
SEQ Water Board- 3229 3399
B.C.C.- 3403 8888 (their website has details from August back regarding bacterial and chemical tests and results)
Pine Rivers Shire Council- 3480 6666
Now for those of you living in the Pine Shire. Those living south of Pods Road Lawnton your water is supplied by the Nth Pine Dam treatment facility. Those living Nth of Pods Road Lawnton your water is supplied from the Petrie treatment facility.
Today I spoke to a chemist from the Pine Shire Council Water Board who gave me quite a bit of info. This is what I got from him:
* First of all the water in the Pine Shire is treated so that the same quality is reached with no variations (his words not mine). However variations will occur once the water has left the water treatment/storage facility from what I am led to believe.
* Secondly [u:e5d4ac45f2][b:e5d4ac45f2]no chloramine is added to water in the Pine Shire other than a small pocket/s around samford[/b:e5d4ac45f2][/u:e5d4ac45f2]. However minute amounts occur naturally.
* Good quality Chlorine neutralisers (those that advertise the breaking down of chlorine and ammonia) can and will break down chloramine. First of all by breaking it down to it's components of chlorine and ammonia. However as matter cannot be created or destroyed it is converted or whatever you want to call it into nitrogeneous gasses and released. Be aware that this is not instantaneous and the larger the quantity of water the longer the period of time required.
* I briefly mentioned about aging water in drums with airstones and sunlight etc. but didn't go into it as I forgot about it but will follow this up. I will be following up firstly the airation side of things then the sunlight/UV aspect of things to see what does the main conversion leading to removal.
* I asked about water purifiers to which he said that they will remove chloramines but the levels of which are dependant upon the cartidges and possibly the exposure time.
*He said that activated carbon WILL remove chloramines from the water. I asked him about maximum exposure times creating maximum removal to which he said yes but really was unaware of the results. He told me about a Dr. possibly from the R.B.H. who was chasing water quality up about 2 years ago. It was regarding dialysis patients and the need to remove certain residuals left from the treatment of their water from their water source (taps etc.) via water purifiers etc. He was going to experiment etc. regarding the true effectiveness of the purifiers across the board from what I believe and said that he would be the best person to get in contact with regarding this subject. At this stage I haven't had a chance to chase him up.
*He said that the best way to test if and how well the water purifiers work in the mean time will be with a chlorine test kit used in pools etc. I don't have a pool and never used a chlorine test kit before but he was saying the first tablet/test tests the chlorine levels in the water and the second tablet/test tests for chloramine's as well as other stuff. Test the water before it goes through the purifier and test the water coming out to see how effective it is then play around with the rates of flow to work out the best flow/removal rate.
However this last point can be used across the board to come up with your own results.
I'll be trying to clarify a bit more regarding this and will pass on any info I find. Hope this helps.
Cheers,
Bryce.
Thank you for that Bryce.
Very interesting stuff! I'll be very interested to hear what you find out about the storage of water. Well done :D
Love your work. Adds more fuel to the water conditioning debate raging on the forums at present, but very interesting to hear what a chemist says.
Look forward to whatever else you find out.
Welcome back Bryce, love your research work.
Confirms a few theories.
Frenchy :D
Very good work Bryce, keep it up.
[quote:49ae98eff6] Be aware that this is not instantaneous and the larger the quantity of water the longer the period of time required.
[/quote:49ae98eff6]
That is why I keep saying, putting the nuetralizer into your tank and then turning on the tap is like playing Russian Roulette.
I've got a Pool Chlorine test kit, I've run tap water through heaps of Carbon, when it comes out the other end, no change(Chlorine).
I've also talked to a distributor of one of the best water purifier cartridges in Brisbane, they will not guarantee their Cartridges for removing the things we want to remove for fish. Also Cartridges have avery limited life and that on its own is reason to be wary of them.
These topics keep coming up and they create good discussions, but the results are always the same. Some things work all the time, some things work some of the time and some things hardly ever work.
I suppose its up to the individual to choose which method he uses.
Theo
Thanks for the replies fellas. As of yet I haven't been able to track down this Doctor but will keep trying. In the mean time I am waiting for a reply from a technician who does the puficiation of water for dialysis patients in R.B.H. and has a great knowledge in this field.
I also haven't been able to track down studies conducted on water purifiers as of yet. I've emailed some Universities as I know experiments have been done on this and am waiting on replies. I'm also going to try and get onto a chemist and see if he can give me a definative explaination on chlorine, chloramine etc. and it's cycle regarding breakdown etc. Hopefully this will explain a few things and give a definative answer as to the best ways to adequately look after the water we use before putting into our tanks.
At the moment I'm trying to track down the average time it takes from the water being treated to get to the storage areas, storage time and time it takes to get from the storage areas into our taps. I'm also trying to find how much water degradation is occuring from source's to outlet areas but I'd bet my left nut that I'll be drawing a blank with that 1 as no council will be keen on that getting out lol.
It's pretty hard to get an accurate guide of timing's but even a general idea is helpful especially for those in the Brisbane Shire due to the extra chemicals used. Hopefully getting optimum times for water changes especially if this rain continues as I know they dose the crap out of the water which will affect it's quality.
Theo,
I'm pretty sure that what the chemist was getting at was that the carbon itself doesn't actually dissipate the chlorine itself. I'm pretty sure he meant that it aids in the breakdown of the chloramine into it's 2 key compounds of ammonia and chlorine and the other components of the cartidge then do their job on the compounds within water.
I'm pretty sure he was alluding to the fact that chemical treatment ie. neutralisers etc. have the greatest affect on releasing chloramines as it is converted into nitrogen gases and released. Obviously airation and water movement with powerheads etc. will be optimum in speeding up this process. But as with any treatments they aren't 100% effective and varying degrees of residuals are left over. It's mminimising these with the best techniques which is the key.
Thats why I'm searching for reseach done on water purifiers and different small time measures etc. as this should explain things a little clearer. It may also help in finding the cheapest most effective method for all of us. This is where the medical field option is the best place to search I feel as they deal with nearly every affect/effect something can have on people so surely there is something there somewhere.
I'm also unsure of the true effectiveness of airating and even using sunlight in removing chloramines. From what I understand from what I have found the air released from the air stone or small pockets of air from a power head will either trap the chlorine molecules or convert them into a gas which with air rising in the water will release it into the atmosphere and out of the container.
However this water movement/airation won't affect chlorimines due to it's combination with ammonia forming a new molecular structure. I may be wrong however but haven't gotten that far as of yet as I'm yet to look into whether ammonia can or will be released, converted or whatever so that air can create an effect on it's release.
Thanks again for the replies fellas and if you's find anything please pass it on as I'm keen to cover any and all angles.
Cheers,
Bryce.
An interesting link in the mean time that answers some general questions about chloramine removal/reduction. Also check out the link within where you can choose different purifiers to reduce different bacteria's, contaminants in the tap water. Hope this helps a little in the mean time.
http://www.psifilters.com.au/Chloramine.htm
Cheers,
Bryce.
I have stopped looking into this chloramine thing for the time being because I have found bucketloads of info on it but most with little relevance to what we are after. Therefore as I said I have put off looking into it until I can refine what it is I/we are trying to find out and the way in which it applies to us as fish keepers. Hopefully it will make it easier for me and those that I am trying to gleen this info from.
I have started a list of questions which I think will cover what it is we are trying to find out and hopefully these may even lead to answering other water related questions. Please feel free to add your own or refine my questions. I will probably start the search again come Sunday or Monday.
The list so far, not forgetting this is to cater for beginners as well so some of the questions may seem to be common sense in their answers but may benefit the overall outcome of the research:
1. What is the process of chloramine breakdown?
2. Letting water containing chloramine stand/age in a bucket will allow the chloramine to breakdown over time, what other contaminants will this reduce?
3. Will aerating the water quicken this process?
4. Will this help reduce the levels of any other contaminants, if so which ones?
5.Is the quickening of this process directly proportional to the level of aeration?
6. What part can/does sunlight play in this process if any?
7. Will U.V. exposure play a role in it's reduction?
8. Is the level of reduction directly proportional to the amount of U.V. exposure?
9. Will a combination of sunlight/U.V. exposure and aeration speed up the breakown/reduction process even further?
10. Activated carbon/charcoal will eventually dissipate chloramine in water, is the level of reduction directly proportional to the time of contact/exposure?
11. Can we guage how long the carbon will be effective in reducing the levels of chloramine?
12. Does chloramine have a larger molecular structure than chlorine making purifiers more effective in trapping it?
13. Do purifiers need to break chloramine down into it's key elements of chlorine and ammonia to work effectively?
14. Do purifiers work more effectively if chloramine is already broken down to it's key elements of chlorine and ammonia?
15. Are water purification cartridges more effective when they contain charcoal?
16. If water purifiers are effective, is the effect directly proportional to flow rate through the purification media or proportional to the level at which the media will filter down to?
17. Is the effect proportional to the level at which the media will filter down to in conjunction to the flow rate through the media?
18. Some chlorine neutralisers state they will reduce or eliminate chlorine and ammonia but will they do the same to chloramine?
18. Do they break the chloramine down into nitrogeneous gases?
19. Obviously the effect will be dependant on the parts per million of chloramine found per litre of water. However is there a guide as to it's effect over time in reducing and eliminating levels of chloramine?
20. Is there a guide for reducing other contaminants found in water?
21. Does mixing the neutraliser through water containing chloramine speed up the breakdown/elimination process?
22. Will aeration in conjunction with the neutraliser speed up the process even further?
If there is anything else that anyone thinks I have missed please feel free to add them or help in refining the questions would be very much appreciated.
Cheers,
Bryce.
8.
I hope you find all the answers you are looking for Bryce, you've certainly got an enquiring mind, and I for one will read with interest your finished essay.
Unfortunately for most people its probably too much info to digest, and I'll quote what I said a couple of days ago.
[quote:a39ed6b4fd]Fishkeeping is fairly simple, unfortunately in our quest for knowledge, we become confused by the mountains of information out there.
I think for a lot of people, including me, it becomes like a scientific experiment, only to find out, after years of research, that fish are a versatile lot, capable of adjusting to and breeding in, reasonably widely varying water parameters.
[/quote:a39ed6b4fd]
Please dont stop what you are doing, every bit of info helps.
An old site that might have some answers, is called The Krib, I know it wont have all of them.
Theo
Theo,
Mate thanks for your reply. It's amazing what a bit of time off and boredom will produce lol. That and I have a habit of invstigating stuff that I don't know about, sometimes a little too much lol but it's all good.
From this I'm hoping to get basic answers like "airating water in sunlight wrmove ....... and reduce levels of ......", etc. SO that I will put it down in point form. As I said so under a method heading I can say that this will do such and such over this period of time. Giving a broad over view so that for once we can have an accurate guide to a few water changing methods all in the 1 spot and each person can make up their mind from their. Maybe once and for all settling the debate about the best and safest way of changing water.
I know some of the questions are really simple and really
Theo,
Mate thanks for your reply. It's amazing what a bit of time off and boredom will produce lol. That and I have a habit of invstigating stuff that I don't know about, sometimes a little too much lol but it's all good.
I know to some it may seem like complicating some pretty simple things for I like you am of the opinion that fish are versitile creatures. I must admit that I do the tap and hose trick on my waterchanges but add the required amount of neutraliser before adding water and another required dosage as I add the water for good measure. As it's on my 8fter and a 25% water change is 300ltr I have played around with the tap so that it takes 3hours to fill it up to the required level. I know some people just smash the water in and this is where most of their problems lie.
I am happy with this method as I've been lucky and I think that the added time I take may help out a bit. However I'm not satisfied that this method is the best way to go about things. As with a lot in fishkeeping varying degrees of personal opinions, experiences, luck and prejudices dictate what we get by way of passage of information but hopefully this will put the arguements to rest about the safest and best ways to go about treating the water for our fish.
I'm also hoping this may answer some questions about other contaminants and their removal as well but point down in simple point form so that novices and experienced fishkeepers alike can gain something from this. Here's to hoping lol.
Cheers,
Bryce.