100% Water "Recycling"

MadReefist

New member
Lately I've been moved by the recent case of Mote Labs raising redfish aquaponically to achieve "100%" water recycling mainly with Mangrove, Sea Purslane & Saltwort phytoremediation / filtration plants.

Been out the game for a few years (its been on and off like this for some 15 years). In the past I contemplated ideas of various overkill to achieve 'no water changes'. Today back playing around again finally I happen to be experimenting with the mangrove & sea purslane.

Now this isn't an argument against water changes. But I am questioning if our water cant still be "recycled" (re-polished) and then be put back in? Yet just 'throwing stuff out' just isn't in my language.

With my current new little experiment tank I'm excited to try to push at the boundaries of natural designs. Yet I have a broad array of NOS chemical filtration materials.

So the question is, especially under a robust natural system (powered by RO water), when we drain the water during a water change, if we were to run that drain water through a powerhouse chemical filtration stack (say in a canister), following supplementation couldn't that water be perfectly cherry to reinsert into the tank again (chemically speaking)?

Presuming a tank had corals, and / or were heavily stocked with various inverts, etc, adding the core supplements probably isn't beyond the usual scope of work. So to pour a few scoops instead of one, by the time you get it all out and do it its of little difference.

I expect it will come down to energy, economics, ecofriendliness, etc (and time the one thing we cant get back).

The bigger the system the more important this would seem to be ad infinitum.

Part of my thinking here is how many have no love/use for the chems, yet users 'enhanced by' said chems are still 'expected' to run water changes just the same. While running the chem elements active through a living complex system would be more challenging for them opposed to running less strained elements remotely in smaller batches than the full setup.

I suppose a sterilization technique would also be relevant during the re-polish. Ozone comes to mind. In the pursuit of simplicity if done remotely (and then left to dissipate) would ozone still require reactor methods (opposed to the norm of it being integrated into the main system)? I happen to have a real decent little bugger I got off aliexpress a while ago for about $25 shipped. You drop the little airstone into a liter of water it takes maybe a minute to make the water stink like ozone (it fades away after a couple days).
 
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