Lanthanum Chloride Safety

jason2459

jason2459

Well-known member
Lanthanum Chloride frankly scares me to use without some very good means of filtering out the precipitation that is formed. I've used Phosfree in the past (many years ago now I guess) as a LaCl3 source and used it by dosing into the intake of a diatom filter that filters down to 1 micron. This was just to get my PO4 levels down to a point that GFO could effectively take over with out being exhausted with in a day.

Mainly my fear comes from reports of damage or death as has been reported in threads like this:
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1474839&page=52

And fears that LaCL3 itself could cause issues
http://www.beananimal.com/articles/lanthanum-chloride-and-tangs.aspx


Using LaCL3 has been around for a while
http://www.coralmagazine-us.com/content/foiling-phosphate

and is used in Large aquariums
http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2007/2/aquarium/


However, LaCL3 products being made for aquarium use are marketing it as safe to use and gives dosing instructions to just dump it into the water. Maybe some of it's filtered out and maybe some isn't.

Like this product
http://acrylictankmanufacturing.com/products/additives/agent-green-phosphate-remover/
Regarding the precipitated particles ("beads")
http://acrylictankmanufacturing.com/mcm_faq/read-agent-green-not-harmful-to-fish/
Regarding left over LaCL3 in the tank
http://acrylictankmanufacturing.com/mcm_faq/happens-excess-agent-green-react/
The rest of the FAQ repeating over and over again the safeness of LaCL3 that's used in agent green
http://acrylictankmanufacturing.com/?_wpnonce=c10556a781&customsearch=mcm_faq&s=agent+green


Another product among many coming to market saying it's totally safe
http://www.tecomarine.com/product/phosphate-remover/


I'd assume many people now have been dosing these products straight into their tanks with out 10micron or less filtration? I know on another forum there's a thread by melev stating over and over again how safe the product is that he sells and he uses it straight into his tank as well.

Is there some magical way that these products are forming LaCL3? That these "beads" are somehow larger particulates then what would be formed by a product like phosfree or seaklear and be safer?

Of course none of that is considering the issue overdosing causing rapid pH reduction and Alk reduction as well as striping out to much to fast.
 
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I suspect the product is the same as the others. I haven't heard of any safer lanthanum chloride products.
 
I figure LaCL3 is LaCL3. But it does make me question the safety of it? Or are they making it so dilute its not making much of an impact? I know the concentration of the phosfree as its in the SDS. I don't know the concentration of seaklear. But I do see its recommended to dilute the products like seaklear before dosing. Once diluted is filtration as big of a concern? It seems to be. It just seems like there's potential to have or we should already be seeing a lot of "mysterious" fish deaths by people buying and using these products with no research on their potential risk.
 
jason2459 said:
Lanthanum Chloride frankly scares me to use without some very good means of filtering out the precipitation that is formed. I've used Phosfree in the past (many years ago now I guess) as a LaCl3 source and used it by dosing into the intake of a diatom filter that filters down to 1 micron. This was just to get my PO4 levels down to a point that GFO could effectively take over with out being exhausted with in a day.

Mainly my fear comes from reports of damage or death as has been reported in threads like this:
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1474839&page=52

And fears that LaCL3 itself could cause issues
http://www.beananimal.com/articles/lanthanum-chloride-and-tangs.aspx


Using LaCL3 has been around for a while
http://www.coralmagazine-us.com/content/foiling-phosphate

and is used in Large aquariums
http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2007/2/aquarium/


However, LaCL3 products being made for aquarium use are marketing it as safe to use and gives dosing instructions to just dump it into the water. Maybe some of it's filtered out and maybe some isn't.

Like this product
http://acrylictankmanufacturing.com/products/additives/agent-green-phosphate-remover/
Regarding the precipitated particles ("beads")
http://acrylictankmanufacturing.com/mcm_faq/read-agent-green-not-harmful-to-fish/
Regarding left over LaCL3 in the tank
http://acrylictankmanufacturing.com/mcm_faq/happens-excess-agent-green-react/
The rest of the FAQ repeating over and over again the safeness of LaCL3 that's used in agent green
http://acrylictankmanufacturing.com/?_wpnonce=c10556a781&customsearch=mcm_faq&s=agent+green


Another product among many coming to market saying it's totally safe
http://www.tecomarine.com/product/phosphate-remover/


I'd assume many people now have been dosing these products straight into their tanks with out 10micron or less filtration? I know on another forum there's a thread by melev stating over and over again how safe the product is that he sells and he uses it straight into his tank as well.

Is there some magical way that these products are forming LaCL3? That these "beads" are somehow larger particulates then what would be formed by a product like phosfree or seaklear and be safer?

Of course none of that is considering the issue overdosing causing rapid pH reduction and Alk reduction as well as striping out to much to fast.
Click to expand...

People have dosed them without the socks but you often hear about issues with anemones and even fish. Tanges especially. Dosing directly into the tank without the use of socks even with the lower concentrated versions generally results in clouding which is the result of the precipitate. The moment LaCl comes in contact with water containing PO4 the reaction occurs and the Po4 precipitate is formed.. There is no way around that. The precipitate results in some clouding which never good for the fish as it effects the gills of the fish and their ability to take in o2. The more you reduce your Po4 through the use of LaCl, the greater the precipitate in the water. Regardless of what the instructions say, dosing directly into 10 micron or less filter socks should always be done to insure the precipitate doesn't get into the water column.

I've been using SeaKlear commercial Phosphate remover (LaCl) for years now and I always use the 10 micron socks and always dilute my LaCl into RODI water and dose the stuff very slowly over the course of several hours. I never see clouding or have any issues as a result of my treatment. I have to question a product that tells you to dose directly into the tank and tell you that clouding will occur. That is just bad news IMO and is NOT safe for many marine species contrary to what the manufacturer says.
 
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I have a vortex xl diatom filter I use 1-2x a year to create a typhoon in the tank.

It's very effective. Especially for dosing lacl3 as it filter at 1 micron. Also very cheap long term as I bought a big bag of DE powder from pool supply store and will last me a lifetime.
 
I did email ATM asking how they can be 100% sure their agent green product is safe for all fish and inverts compare to other lanthanum chloride products that aren't.
 
I used their stuff and it was good. I also used seaklear.

I dose directly into the intake of my monster skimmer... very little particulate can survive it.

With the ATM stuff, I never got a negative reaction, but it's like 100x the cost per reactive LaCl content as the SeaKlear. I think that's why it's safer. The concentration in the raw pool grade stuff is so high, that 5ml, even in my 660gal is a big deal.

So, with the ATM stuff, I never had a problem - but I haven't bought it again due to cost.

With the SeaKlear, I slowly upped the dose until my purple tang started having fits and breathing hard. That's the first sign that there's trouble. I had little life in the tank back then, so I could experiment more.

I backed off the dose and eventually went to 1/10th and he was fine again. I eventually stopped as my man-made rocks stopped leaching P and just use a GFO occasionally now.

So, I think the dosage is key... the concentrated pool grade stuff should be diluted 100x and then dosed into a filter or a skimmer (in my case).

I know this isn't useful without the quantities I dosed - but I'd have to look that up and I'm a little lazy today :) but still wanted to share.
 
I do have to comment on the LaCl reactor... seriously, a clear tube with a dense pack of fine floss/cotton, an inlet, outlet and dosing airline tube..... $285 (260EU)...

Why. why, why??
 
So bertoni, to dilute the LaCl... just add RODI water? would any P (0.1 ppm?) in the water immediately just precipitate out and the rest is fine to use?
 
Yes, RO/DI should be fine to dilute with.

I dosed a few drops at a time undiluted into my diatom filter back when I used it.

I also wonder how dilute that agent green is or many of the aquarium specific products like it are. But according to their FAQ, if I remember right, they recommend dropping 1ppm per day of PO4 and they have something that tells you how much to dose to achieve that. I didn't look that much further into it but someone should be able to figure the concentration based on that by comparing to how much something like phosfree drops PO4 by 1ppm as that product does provide its concentration and how much of the product will drop X amount of phosphates.

I'm to distracted to do it myself right now. Maybe if my ADD kicks in enough I'll get distracted enough to circle around to doing it.

But that also assumes their recommendations are accurate...
 
No reply from ATM yet but I wasn't expecting one. I'm going to call their customer support line tomorrow and ask.
 
Called their support and sales line. Conveniently no one was available but I left a voicemail so someone can get back to me.
 
jason2459 said:
Lanthanum Chloride frankly scares me to use without some very good means of filtering out the precipitation that is formed. I've used Phosfree in the past.
Click to expand...

Dilution: 1x100
Filtering: Diatom to 1 micron

Dosage: ??

How about a 10micron sock (after the display) 50g ahead of a skimmer, would this be sufficient?
 
They actually called me back and ready to talk about Agent Green. The person on the phone was really nice and seemed to know the product well and disclosed what he could. It didn't really convince me it was 100% safe but here's the quick notes I got from the call

1. ATM doesn't just relabel any of their products. They make all their products in house.
2. ATM sources the lanthanum ore from a reliable source
3. There's 5 different ways to make LaCL3. ATM makes it the right way to be safe for our tanks
4. Agent Green has been in use commercially for at least 10 years
5. Aqua culture farms and large aquariums have never had any issues with their agent green product
6. They received a call of one person accidentally putting an entire bottle into a tank but had no deaths or damages to anything in it
7. There has been no actual study to show there's anything toxic or harmful with LaCL3

I questioned more about number 3 but couldn't get anything else other then they can't know how other products are made but can assure me that they are making their LaCL3 correct. At one point because I asked in a few different ways and I can't remember how I actually phrased this one question but he mentioned that in the end agent green is just Lanthanum Chloride but didn't explain how a compound LaCL3 could be different from LaCL3.

Later on I asked in a deferent way about the safety or any concerns with the fish's gills or HLLE caused by the precipitate that happens and he explained that as with any product you wouldn't want to over use it and for some reason used GAC as an example. He explained that just like with carbon it's a safe product but if used wrong could product HLLE. I'm thinking to myself that yes, GAC, if not rinsed well could allow very small particles like the precipitation that is created by lanthanum chloride when bonding with phosphates to get into the tank and cause issues with Fish. Particularly Tangs.

He then brought up another call that a lady in California called in about which was that she had a couple tangs and one of them would act weird when ever she dosed Agent Green in her tank. She said when ever it got cloudy one of her tangs (Powder Blue I think it was) would go into hiding but the rest of her fish including another tang acted just fine. The rep asked her if after the cloudiness disappeared if the tang that went into hiding would come out and she said yes everything was normal after those events. So, the person I talked with on the phone used that as an example of the safeness of their Agent Green.
 
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