1.1.1 Source Water - City Mains Water Is Not Good Enough: Background
Description
This article is from the ReefKeepers FAQ, by several authors (see the Credits section).
1.1.1 Source Water - City Mains Water Is Not Good Enough: Background
* US EPA requirements for water quality from municipal sources are
insufficiently pure for reef tank usage. For instance, the EPA
standard for Nitrate (as NO3-N) is 10.0 mg/l, over twice the
recommended maximum level. Extremely toxic (to inverts) heavy
metals such as copper are allowed at levels as high as 1 mg/l.
Most public water supplies have contaminates well below the EPA
levels and some reef tanks have done fine on some public supplies.
In general, however, it is recommended that some form of post
processing be performed on public water before it is introduced
into the reef tank.
Although some people have access to distilled, de-ionized or
reverse osmosis water from public sources, most will use a home
sized system to produce their tank water. The two most common
systems used are de-ionization resins, and reverse osmosis
membranes.
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