Ottawa water quality report

Mariner00 · Jun 2, 2018

Hello there,

RODI treated water aside could someone who is savy in the chemistry of city treated water comment on this report? I'm curious as I am about to start up a new tank.

Thanks for your input. https://documents.ottawa.ca/sites/documents.ottawa.ca/files/2017_WQ Summary Table_Lemieux.pdf

sbash · Jun 3, 2018

I can't comment to the chemistry, but I recall the dudes at Marinescape told me they just use tap water. This was many years ago, and while I was dealing with my Ottawa City water having high ammonia straight out of the tap, almost nuked my whole tank (most of my livestock died) because I didn't have a D/I filter on my RO system...

That said, the link provided show trace amount of a bunch of not so reef-safe chemicals and minerals...

Randy Holmes-Farley · Jun 3, 2018

What you do not have in a report like this one is a measure of copper at your tap. It comes from your own pipes, so doesn't show up in a chemistry report on the water at the water facility.
That's my main concern with tap water.

There is also a lot of dissolved silica/silicate. I dosed silicate so I'm not one of those people who worries tremendously about it, but it may prolong diatom issues since every top off will supply more silicate.

Mariner00 · Jun 3, 2018

Randy Holmes-Farley said:
What you do not have in a report like this one is a measure of copper at your tap. It comes from your own pipes, so doesn't show up in a chemistry report on the water at the water facility.
That's my main concern with tap water.

There is also a lot of dissolved silica/silicate. I dosed silicate so I'm not one of those people who worries tremendously about it, but it may prolong diatom issues since every top off will supply more silicate.

Thanks for the response. I have read some of your articles including your experience with silicates. I'll also buy a copper test kit to check on my levels. Thanks again.