COPPER the potential hidden killer in a reef tank

[disc1]

I was trying to make a humorous point to drive home a very real issue that some continue to make light of using high school chemistry, false premises, bad math, false statements, and totally ignore the biological chemistry in a reef tank.

High school chemistry? You'd better check again.

I haven't seen any science come out of you . So far you've quoted a bunch of articles that really don't support the points you're trying to make. And when the science gets above your head, you change the subject or ignore the question.

And now you're calling names.



I'm leaving this thread. Those who are regular on RC know my chemistry. It's more than a few years past high school.


Address this: If there is 20ppb of copper in my RODI water, and my TDS meter reads zero, then where did the other ions go? Did the RODI somehow eliminate 100% of everything but copper? Explain how that is possible.

 

[jimmy frag]

hi David. i in no form am questioning your experiance. but there is copper in salt mix that will build up over time. i looked up I.O. reef crystal salt and they claim the add a detoxifing component for copper. what could this be. Jimmy

 

[disc1]

hi David. i in no form am questioning your experiance. but there is copper in salt mix that will build up over time. i looked up I.O. reef crystal salt and they claim the add a detoxifing component for copper. what could this be. Jimmy

I'm not sure what exactly they add, but here's a link that explains what goes on in the ocean. They are certainly using some form of chelation to remove the copper from the biological supply chain. What ligand exactly I couldn't tell you.


Read section 6.02.5.1

I think the deal about cyanobacteria is really neat. Could they be used to detoxify bad water in a reef tank? That would be a neat experiment.

http://andrew.ucsd.edu/courses/sio263/downloads/brulandlohan-tog2003.pdf

 

[jason2459]

hi David. i in no form am questioning your experiance. but there is copper in salt mix that will build up over time. i looked up I.O. reef crystal salt and they claim the add a detoxifing component for copper. what could this be. Jimmy

I don't think there is anyone arguing that there isn't an issue with coper in our water, salt, plumbing, food, additives, etc... What comes into question is the ability to remove copper from the water you use for mixing the salt in or top off. A properly maintained ro/di should be able to do that. However, there are just as bad things or worse that could be in your source water that could get though if you don't have the right filters setup like cloramines which is why you really need to find out what is in your source water and a call to your water company could help with that. They may also be able to let you know the average copper levels coming out of the tap in your area. And if you do have copper coming through your ro/di you probably have many other just as harsh metals coming through at higher concentrations that you could detect with a TDS meter.

 

[disc1]

Here's another article that describes some of the ligands.

They looked at the affinity for several ligands that occur naturally in seawater and a few that don't. Among the natural chelators, the amino acid histidine was the strongest.

http://www.terrapub.co.jp/journals/GJ/pdf/1201/12010021.PDF

 

[BeanAnimal]

hi David. i in no form am questioning your experiance. but there is copper in salt mix that will build up over time. i looked up I.O. reef crystal salt and they claim the add a detoxifing component for copper. what could this be. Jimmy

Jimmy,

It would help if you read the entire thread. Nobody is saying that copper is not an a potential problem, we all agree that it is. The ISSUE is that Graham is overstating the real world probability of it being introduced via the SOURCE WATER that supplies the average reef.

He has strung together loose facts and worst case scenarios in an attempt to give the impresseion that we are all at extreme risk, if not already poisened by our source water.

 

[jimmy frag]

hi beananimal. i have read the entire thead. it does bounce around abit. for me...im interested more in the amount of copper that we are adding through other means. David, thanx, for the interesting read...its amazing what goes on in our oceans. Jimmy

 

[BeanAnimal]

hi beananimal. i have read the entire thread. it does bounce around abit. for me...im interested more in the amount of copper that we are adding through other means.

Then you realize that none of us are arguaing that those other means exist, and in fact our point (counter that of Graham) has been that these "other means" are of FAR MORE significance than copper imported via our source water.

While the title of the thread may appear to indicate this is a discussion about the dangers of copper, it is not. Graham titled the thread from the perspective that we are all killing our tanks with our tap water and RO/DI systems. He has spent considerable time trying to give credence to that point. You stated that you agreed with him 100%...

I don't think anybody here has a problem with using or advising the precautionary use of PolyFilter, Cuprisorb or any other copper treatment that is non-invasive to the system. It may well be a very good practice and worth every penny.

In any case, I (like Dave) am not going to stick around to be called names.

Happy Reefing

 

[jimmy frag]

beananimal..i am not calling you names so i see no reason for you to jump all over me. everything i have read so far on ro/di systems is they claim to be better than the other guy because this one has a 98% rejection rating. so where is the other 2% that was not rejected. how many times have you read that a reefers water source preasure is 40 or lower psi wich you know you nead at least 60 psi for you unit to work to its full potential. how about your tds meter not really reading 0 tds. or the reefers that didnt know anything about tds meters. on these facts, yes i agree 100% with the OP. i in any case found DAVE vary knowladgable and credit him for that. but, what dave has stated has still got me reading as he is way more advanced than i. so please take a step back on me as im just following along and learning. sorry if my comments upset you. jimmy

 

[zigzag1]

Going to add my two cents here, well... just because I can. It's nice to have a place to have these discussions. Raising your concern for discussion is a good thing to do, I appreciate that. In fact, I often learn something from the concerns of others. Part of having a mature discussion is not being afraid to admit that you may be overreacting, or were wrong, seeing the logic in others thoughts without taking it on a personal level. Any less than a mature discussion just discredits you in the post and in the future.

The concerns of copper at first glance seem to have validity. Oooo oohh scary around this Halloween time, no less.

Thanks to those (David, et al) that have explained how and why the fears are unfounded using real logic and chemistry for those of us that that take care in a reasonable manner. Thanks for laying these obviously overestimated problems to rest in a manner easily understood by even by those like me with much less technical background in these areas. It's great to have real experts around RC! Thank you! You are truly appreciated! Again, JMTC!

 

[BeanAnimal]

beananimal..i am not calling you names so i see no reason for you to jump all over me.

Jimmy,

It would appear you are having a bit of trouble following the context of the conversations in this thread. It is not you that did the name calling and I have not jumped all over you, nor am I upset. I kindly responded to your post and attempted to help you with the context of the conversation.

With regard to your RO/DO system and TDS, this has been covered fairly extensivly in the posts in the thread but I will paraphrase for you.

Firstly, assuming there is a high concentration of copper in the source water, it has to pass through the RO membrane. The disolved copper is larger than many of the other disolved solids that are presented to the reverse osmosis membrane. That means that your 2% (or whatever) that does pass through is NOT going to be copper, but mostly smaller compounds. Secondly, that water then passes through at least one DI stage, where again, any copper (in the off chance that there is any) has a much higher affinity to the resin than most of the other ions in the water.

So we come full circle. For most of us, copper import via our source water is not a reality.