Jump to content

Recommended Posts

Bad Gas

Or How Long It Really Takes to Remove Chlorine and Chloramine

902515354_BADGAS.jpg.a4d38a25b23cdb7257c30495c6fa2fdc.jpg

After seeing  @Odd Duck 's ingenious 'pre-mixing' rig that he created for automatically pre-mixing the dechlorinator for water changes, I thought about this data I've had for some time about chemical-free degassing.  Though it was more useful 30 years ago than now!  But hopefully some may still find it interesting.

In the 1970s, I had 5 small marine tanks. Mixing salt and minerals in a bucket. I used to degass the water by simply waiting for 2-3 days. Others I knew set up a reservoir tank outside to allow the sun to assist and used it in 24 hours. A few years into it, a local pharmacist turned me on to Sodium Thiosulfate and sold me bottles of it to dechlorinate my fish tank water, making life substantially easier.

With so many good dechlorinators available now, it seems dated to discuss this but for those of us old enough to remember degassing as the default dechlorination technique, it attaches some interesting numbers to dechlorination and perhaps some potential for automatic water changing setups.

 

Most municipalities have their water parameters available online. You can check the chemical and mineral content in publicly available reports such as this one from LA County:

LA County Water Quality and Content

Most will use Chlorine + chloramine. Here in greater Los Angeles, the Chlorine + chloramine content is as high as 4PPM (the federal limit), which would be fatal to most fish.

Both Chlorine and chloramine can be most quickly negated by boiling but that is rarely a practical approach!  Aeration and agitation will accelerate this and while VERY effective on chlorine, it's still rather impractical for chloramine.

However, UV light can GREATLY accelerate the breakdown and dissipation of both Chlorine and chloramine though, sometimes to its own detriment.

In LA, with its 300+ sunny days a year, many public swimming pools are covered in part to prevent the UV from degrading the disinfecting action of the Chlorine/chloramine as the UV breaks it down within hours. Most use an additive, cyanuric acid to prevent UV light from breaking down Chlorine in pools.

 

The addition of chloramine to Chlorine treatment by municipal water supplies is well thought out though.  Partly gas, partly solid, but both are timed to continue their disinfection almost seamlessly over the life cycle of the two.

1680044961_ChlorineChart.png.c70327c18ed2a38f9d5d5a096e7630ed.png

 

This is the decay of the Chlorine + chloramine in a 29-gallon, rectangular, open top tank at 80* and PH=8.

If you look at the red line, it is the normal water with no agitation nor treatment. Notice the slow decay of disinfectant level. At Hour 24, the Chlorine has actually dissipated (shown as a barely perceivable dip encircled on the red curve around Hour 24) but the chloramine maintains the level, almost perfectly linearly, as if it was just added at Hour 24. It slowly degasses, each hour about the same amount, until Hour 180 upon which it reads 0. That's some quality engineering.

It's also a very long time to get rid of Chlorine!

Notice the green line. The same exact rig but with aeration. Just mild aeration and it drops from 180 hours to 70 hours. Better. But still too long...

Then the interesting one.

The blue line represents the same setup again, with aeration plus a commonly available UV light sterilizer for fish tanks. This UV sterilizer had a 13w bulb and an output of about 200GPH. The UV added so much photochemical energy, it was completely devoid of both Chlorine and chloramine in under 6 hours!

But next is the kind of thing that gets me excited (although I'm easily amused)!

Notice the small, red circle on each of the curves. That encircles the "knee" of each curve. That 'knee' is where the Chlorine has been exhausted but the chloramine is still very much active. With aeration alone, the chlorine is gone in 6 hours, but the chloramine needs 70 hours to be removed.

But look at the red circle on the blue curve. The UV light completely removed the chlorine in only 2 hours and totally removed the chloramine in 6 hours!

Even fa$ter?

UV dechlorination  can be sped up with much stronger UV light. The UV sterilizer mentioned above is a “low pressure” lamp whereas high output dechlorination lamps are known as “medium pressure”.

Should you have an extra $700 lying around, this UV light can be a conditional alternative to ROI, if your water’s mineral composition is desirable, at a reasonable size and cost:

Mighty Pure UV Water Purifiers 3–20 GPM NSF - BuyUltraviolet

2064677486_6ba81c1805712be49a8cd01e298c(1).jpg.488351bc861eeb30706aa9d486b64f1a.jpg

By passing your faucet through this device, it will remove 100% of the Chlorine, chloramine and all microbes with UV light, without changing another single aspect of the water, all in a single pass (but the GPH depends on cost).  This one disinfects at a rate of 180GPH, but it would need to run at about 1/10th the disinfection rate to dechlorinate as well, making the output about 15-20GPH.

The more reasonably priced ones may be of value for automatic water changers if ROI isn't required or the lost minerals ROI removes are actually desired. No membranes nor filters will ever clog, no microbes will pass, and all the minerals will be retained, (if the latter is actually a good thing). Every 10,000 hours of use you'll need a new bulb and an occasional cleaning.

But spending about $2000 or much more enables some 200GPH or more of dechlorinated and disinfected water to exit and these come in as large a scale as one can imagine or afford.

These are industrial in size but are industry standards for chemical-free dechlorination and disinfection:

UV Dechlorination, Chemical-Free

1420086808_uv-product-ani-1(1).gif.22d5ebcfd843406851d4303dc0b2f072.gif

These industrial UV dechlorinators are used in breweries and laboratories for extremely high purity water systems where no amount of Chlorine or especially, the inert byproducts of chemical dechlorinization may remain in the water.

With this device, it is your water with no disinfectants or microbes at any flow rate you wish, all else unchanged. 

 

Personally, I just use Prime!

If there's a reason to degass without using a dechlorinator, admittedly I don't actually know what that would be but perhaps others may.

Nonetheless, I thought some might find the data interesting! 

 

 

CH Chart 4 ACP.jpg

Edited by dasaltemelosguy
Improved Chart
  • Like 2
  • Thanks 2
  • Love 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Chlorine + Chloramine?

Chloramine = Chlorine + Ammonia. 

Also, the time to de-gas chlorine is not the same for everyone unless everyone has the same residual chlorine in their distribution system.  *Off-gassing does not remove chloramine.

*It can "off-gas" but it can take weeks/months whereas chlorine takes hours.

https://www.freshwatersystems.com/blogs/blog/how-to-remove-chloramines-from-water

 

Edited by KBOzzie59
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 12/18/2021 at 1:20 PM, KBOzzie59 said:

Chlorine + Chloramine?

Chloramine = Chlorine + Ammonia. 

Also, the time to de-gas chlorine is not the same for everyone unless everyone has the same residual chlorine in their distribution system.  *Off-gassing does not remove chloramine.

*It can "off-gas" but it can take weeks/months whereas chlorine takes hours.

https://www.freshwatersystems.com/blogs/blog/how-to-remove-chloramines-from-water

 

That is largely correct and the case in practice. However, how you get the energy to dissimilate chloramine can be chemical, time or that required energy can take another form. 

Chloramine is difficult because although it's considered a compound of ammonia and Chlorine, it's actually an umbrella term for several compounds that as you said, resemble Chlorine + Ammonia. But in truth, it's composed of 3 compounds only related to that combination and only molecularly so and not atomically.

To that end it requires slightly different energy to be dissimilated than the Chlorine gas.

I think the wavelengths required to dissimilate chloramine with UV light in the time on the charts are 220nm, 250nm and 280nm. This is done to force the chloramines to degrade linearly, with the change in the color temperature of the sun at different times of the day. I love great engineering!

Each will dissimilate 5PPM of chloramine/compound which is why one of the lights is rated at removing 15PPM of chloramine in a single pass. But each wavelength dissimilates each form of the 3 chloramines better than the others so that's a summary of the total. 

In the time frame on the chart, I measured the chloramine portion as 2PPM and in 6 hours with UV, it dropped to 0.02PPM.

It's really about the right form of energy, be it chemical, electrical or photolysis-based as in this case, the right type of light energy will break it down regardless of the form the energy takes.  

Edited by dasaltemelosguy
Added explanation of the 3 chloramine types in use.
  • Like 5
  • Thanks 1
  • Love 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

@dasaltemelosguy I really do love how randomly posted stuff on the forum leads somebody else to somewhere else entirely!  Great information and I 100% used to fill a bucket of water, add an airstone, and run it for 24 hours before doing water changes “back in the day”.  I can’t remember exactly when I started using chemical dechlorinator, but it was likely somewhere in the very early 80’s.

I’m sure I’ve read articles and seen charts on some of this, but this is a great compilation and explanation of old data plus a new way to look at things, too.  I knew that UV inactivates chlorine based disinfectants, but it never crossed my mind to use a UV filter and test the results to prove efficacy for aquarium water.  Good work!

I wish I didn’t have liquid rock coming from my faucets (it’s not as bad as what I grew up with in Nebraska), so I’ll still need some RODI to mix with dechlorinated tap for some of the species I want to keep and breed, but this may be immensely helpful for some forum members.

  • Like 1
  • Love 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thanks for this it made interesting reading and did lead me to check what my water company reports about my supply. 

So I have learned that the only thing added to my water is chlorine and that the average amount added is 0.74ppm so it's possible that gassing off overnight with an airstone would be sufficient (if I have read the graphs correctly). But prime still feels substantially less hassle to make it worth the money.

It also provided me with a list of the waters mineral content which made for interesting reading. 

  • Like 3
  • Love 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 12/18/2021 at 3:48 PM, Odd Duck said:

@dasaltemelosguy I really do love how randomly posted stuff on the forum leads somebody else to somewhere else entirely!  Great information and I 100% used to fill a bucket of water, add an airstone, and run it for 24 hours before doing water changes “back in the day”.  I can’t remember exactly when I started using chemical dechlorinator, but it was likely somewhere in the very early 80’s.

 

I think no one has started more 'think tanks' here than you have! It's seriously impressive.

I remember those days and what still shocks me to this day is I never heard of the Nitrogen Cycle in the 70s and somehow, the fish survived! I'm guessing we had a much high mortality rate in those days but it's so long ago, I forget!

  • Like 1
  • Thanks 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 12/18/2021 at 4:37 PM, Flumpweesel said:

Thanks for this it made interesting reading and did lead me to check what my water company reports about my supply. 

So I have learned that the only thing added to my water is chlorine and that the average amount added is 0.74ppm so it's possible that gassing off overnight with an airstone would be sufficient (if I have read the graphs correctly). But prime still feels substantially less hassle to make it worth the money.

It also provided me with a list of the waters mineral content which made for interesting reading. 

That's really fortuitous. 0.74PPM? You must have very clean water biologically. LA County states 4PPM! And it measures as 3PPM-4PPM out of the faucet! I too feel more secure adding Prime too. I'm sure you're right about gassing with that quality water. Would you ship me a few hundred gallons?! 😉

  • Haha 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 12/18/2021 at 6:50 PM, dasaltemelosguy said:

I think no one has started more 'think tanks' here than you have! It's seriously impressive.

I remember those days and what still shocks me to this day is I never heard of the Nitrogen Cycle in the 70s and somehow, the fish survived! I'm guessing we had a much high mortality rate in those days but it's so long ago, I forget!

I think we might be pretty even on the idea generation around here along with a few others I could name.

Seems like some species have much better survival rates now and some worse.  Neons seem to be worse, guppies seem to be worse, otos seem to be worse.  Some Bettas are much worse - Diamond eye was virtually unheard of, tumors were rare, and no one had self-mutilation and self fin nipping issues “back in the day”.

Most others species, we have improved our knowledge of fish keeping so much that it’s possible to keep species we never could have kept for very long back then and certainly weren’t breeding in the home aquarium back then.

I’ve always been a reader and the mom and pop basement fish store that was pretty much the only one available to me back then, had used books for good prices, so I feel like I learned about the nitrogen cycle very early.  But I shudder to think of all the mistakes I made and all the fish that have died in my care over the decades I’ve been keeping fish.  I strive to do better and be a better fish keeper.  I don’t always achieve that as well as I want, but I keep trying.  Because I still love fish more than 46 years since my first tank.

  • Like 3
  • Love 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 12/18/2021 at 1:59 PM, dasaltemelosguy said:

If there's a reason to degass without using a dechlorinator, admittedly I don't actually know what that would be but perhaps others may.

Turtles' lungs prefer water that is not chemically dechlorinated. Meanwhile, the fish [in the turtle pond] die in chlorine/chloramine. I've been using a phytoremediation pond for the turtle's water, although this would be easier and year-round. 

Sadly, it's not economically feasible....😬

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 12/18/2021 at 9:20 PM, Torrey said:

Turtles' lungs prefer water that is not chemically dechlorinated. Meanwhile, the fish [in the turtle pond] die in chlorine/chloramine. I've been using a phytoremediation pond for the turtle's water, although this would be easier and year-round. 

Sadly, it's not economically feasible....😬

You should be able to aerate your dechlorinated water for a few hours, then do water changes in your turtle tank.  Or run block charcoal filters on your water for the fishes sake. Turtles potentially are better off with the chlorine/chloramine left in the water.  It can reduce risk of skin and shell infections for them.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 12/18/2021 at 8:48 PM, Odd Duck said:

You should be able to aerate your dechlorinated water for a few hours, then do water changes in your turtle tank.  Or run block charcoal filters on your water for the fishes sake. Turtles potentially are better off with the chlorine/chloramine left in the water.  It can reduce risk of skin and shell infections for them.

Before we had supply issues, we could use filtered (very, very well filtered) tap water. There are a few problems with our tap water:

1. Kirtland AFB had a massive jet fuel leak that went unreported for several years.

2. We really do have liquid rock, as in physicians here tell people to buy bottled water. Even the filtered water has enough dissolved calcium to cause kidney stones 😬

3. I'll be back with the local water report (if it's available)

@Odd Duck thank you for letting me know that I can aerate dechlorinated water for turtle water changes! That makes life easier. Karma is an ornate ornata who didn't get the memo that she's supposed to prefer land for locating food.

She has taught us how smart turtles can be. 

1. She will bark at us if her pond needs attention. 

2. She loves to move the rocks in the pond to hunt for snails.

3. She will nose the turtle pellets against the side of the pond, and then catch and eat the endlers that show up to eat the pellets.

4. She prefers live, planted plant foods, to preharvested plants... but will dig up her greens to catch her preferred meal: worms

  • Love 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 12/19/2021 at 12:55 AM, dasaltemelosguy said:

Would you ship me a few hundred gallons?!

Come to the UK the water is lovely!

This is probably a big bonus for living in the rainiest part of a rainy Island. Most of my water comes from lakes, rivers and reservoirs in national parkland. Also the water company's here are fined by the government for leaks on the mains or for imposing drought measures (except in extreme conditions) which helps to ensure that the supply is well maintained so no need to heavily treat to make up for it.

A few years ago they discovered a contaminate one of the holding tanks at treatment center while we had to boil our water for awhile they treated it with UV and compensation was issued.

  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 12/18/2021 at 10:44 PM, Torrey said:

Before we had supply issues, we could use filtered (very, very well filtered) tap water. There are a few problems with our tap water:

1. Kirtland AFB had a massive jet fuel leak that went unreported for several years.

2. We really do have liquid rock, as in physicians here tell people to buy bottled water. Even the filtered water has enough dissolved calcium to cause kidney stones 😬

3. I'll be back with the local water report (if it's available)

@Odd Duck thank you for letting me know that I can aerate dechlorinated water for turtle water changes! That makes life easier. Karma is an ornate ornata who didn't get the memo that she's supposed to prefer land for locating food.

She has taught us how smart turtles can be. 

1. She will bark at us if her pond needs attention. 

2. She loves to move the rocks in the pond to hunt for snails.

3. She will nose the turtle pellets against the side of the pond, and then catch and eat the endlers that show up to eat the pellets.

4. She prefers live, planted plant foods, to preharvested plants... but will dig up her greens to catch her preferred meal: worms

@Odd Duck &  @dasaltemelosguy I found our lackluster water report.

One of the things that annoys me, is the water authority here conveniently leaves out information like: the jet fuel spill that contaminated the aquifer, the chemical plant spill that did the same, and the fact that the entire water infrastructure was designed to be replaced in the late 1970's... it hasn't... and there have been a massive increase in water main leaks ever since they began fracking and we started having regular 3.2 to 4.6 earthquakes.

But here's our water report:

Your Drinking Water – Water Quality by Distribution Zone –  Bernalillo County Water Utility Authority
https://www.abcwua.org/your-drinking-water-water-quality-by-distribution-zone/

 

 

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

@dasaltemelosguy; Thank you, it is refreshing to discuss something other than fish diseases, snails, or algae for a change. When I saw the heading "Bad Gas," I thought it was a discussion of methane, AKA swamp gas in our tanks caused by using pool filter sand, I'm glad that your topic isn't about methane.

Orlando, FL has the safest drinking water in the US according to Dr. Oz. The Orlando Utilities Commission (OUC) ran a six-week series of articles in The Orlando Sentinel in 2002 about the source and treatment of their water. Chloramine is the only disinfectant used in their water treatment process because it stays active for seven days, making their drinking water safer over the time it's in their pipes.

It's possibly interesting to note that one of those articles said that the source of the OUCs' water is the Floridan aquifer, and that water is made up of rain and snow melt that fell on the Appalachian Mountains 1,000 years ago. It's also this same water that make tourist attractions such as Silver Springs and others possible, but due to industrial pollution, there is only 850 years of safe, clean water remaining in the Floridan aquifer.

I live in the Appalachian Mountains now and I've seen the industrial pollution first-hand, everyone has seen it, but the state will not do anything to stop it because those polluters are creating jobs. The state politicians keep federal monitors and officials away and it's anyone's guess how.

As @Odd Duck stated, back in the 50s', 60s', 70s', and early 80s', I used to keep water in buckets so the chlorine, the only additive used at the time, to evaporate out before I could use it in a tank, then Hartz Mountain came out with a dechlorinater that worked very well. I still put 8 drops of Tetras' Aqua Safe in one-gallon jugs for my livebearers, and I still put the cap on the jug and let it sit out for several days to bring the water temp up to room temp before changing the water.

The fastest way to remove Chlorine and chloramine is by RODI which takes only seconds. The first stage is a particulate filter that removes solid materials, just like the pre-filter on our filters. The second, or maybe third depending on your RODI unit, is activated carbon which removes all chemicals from the water including chlorine and chloramine. The third, or second stage is the RO unit itself which removes most of the Calcium carbonate and Phosphates. The fourth stage is the UV sterilization to kill all microbes we don't want to drink.

My LFS uses a whole building RODI unit as do most hospitals. As big as some hospitals are, it would be interesting to find out how they are able to do that, but what do I know? 

As @Torrey stated, water reports are lackluster at best.

I still like the topic, though.

Edited by Gator
  • Like 2
  • Love 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 12/19/2021 at 12:51 PM, Gator said:

@dasaltemelosguy; Thank you, it is refreshing to discuss something other than fish diseases, snails, or algae for a change. When I saw the heading "Bad Gas," I thought it was a discussion of methane, AKA swamp gas in our tanks caused by using pool filter sand, I'm glad that your topic isn't about methane.

Orlando, FL has the safest drinking water in the US according to Dr. Oz. The Orlando Utilities Commission (OUC) ran a six-week series of articles in The Orlando Sentinel in 2002 about the source and treatment of their water. Chloramine is the only disinfectant used in their water treatment process because it stays active for seven days, making their drinking water safer over the time it's in their pipes.

It's possibly interesting to note that one of those articles said that the source of the OUCs' water is the Floridan aquifer, and that water is made up of rain and snow melt that fell on the Appalachian Mountains 1,000 years ago. It's also this same water that make tourist attractions such as Silver Springs and others possible, but due to industrial pollution, there is only 850 years of safe, clean water remaining in the Floridan aquifer.

I live in the Appalachian Mountains now and I've seen the industrial pollution first-hand, everyone has seen it, but the state will not do anything to stop it because those polluters are creating jobs. The state politicians keep federal monitors and officials away and it's anyone's guess how.

As @Odd Duck stated, back in the 50s', 60s', 70s', and early 80s', I used to keep water in buckets so the chlorine, the only additive used at the time, to evaporate out before I could use it in a tank, then Hartz Mountain came out with a dechlorinater that worked very well. I still put 8 drops of Tetras' Aqua Safe in one-gallon jugs for my livebearers, and I still put the cap on the jug and let it sit out for several days to bring the water temp up to room temp before changing the water.

The fastest way to remove Chlorine and chloramine is by RODI which takes only seconds. The first stage is a particulate filter that removes solid materials, just like the pre-filter on our filters. The second, or maybe third depending on your RODI unit, is activated carbon which removes all chemicals from the water including chlorine and chloramine. The third, or second stage is the RO unit itself which removes most of the Calcium carbonate and Phosphates. The fourth stage is the UV sterilization to kill all microbes we don't want to drink.

My LFS uses a whole building RODI unit as do most hospitals. As big as some hospitals are, it would be interesting to find out how they are able to do that, but what do I know? 

As @Torrey stated, water reports are lackluster at best.

I still like the topic, though.

"Water reports are lackluster at best"

That pretty much sums it up....

I was helping someone collate data in the 2 years leading up to Flint going public. What none of the media outlets wanted to report is the fact that there were (at that time) 60 municipalities with water **worse** than Flint.

23 of those municipalities are on reservations, the other 37 are where one would expect: highest levels of pollution overall (the eye-opening discovery for me was closest to home).

I still have not seen anything in the media, so I expect things have not improved. One of the things I appreciate most about Aquarium Co-op is how Cory brings nuance to what people try to make black and white issues regarding environmental responsibility. I would really appreciate some of that responsibility in the media, to discuss why reservations don't have potable water, and why the Appalachians up into the Adirondacks have some of the most polluted ground water....

  • Like 1
  • Love 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
 Share

×
×
  • Create New...