Water quality report Qs

[RD.]

One of the main reasons most water treatment facilities use chloramine, is because the production of trihalomethane is much lower from it, compared to the use of straight (free) chlorine as a disinfectant.

That, and overall it is far more longer lasting in a distribution system, compared to chlorine, especially in larger systems that have many miles of distribution. I'm guessing cost effectiveness has had just as much to do with the switch as public safety. I could never understand why years ago hobbyists would get so up in arms over the use of chloramine, I prefer it over chlorine. Overall we have had far greater consistency in disinfectant residual, compared to 20 yrs ago.

 

[duanes]

I agree that slight percent of extra ammonia added to create a chloramine compound (1part ammonia to+/- 4 parts chlorine) would be quickly used up in a well bio-filtered aquarium. I never worried about it, but always add new water to sumps, not directly to a tank (for more reasons than just that) .
And when using chloramine, as a opposed to straight chlorine, the amount of chlorine needed to have a lasting residual in the distribution system, is actually less.
So instead of adding 3 or 4 ppm free chlorine to maintain a lasting residual throughout the miles of a system, we were adding only 1.5 to 2ppm chloramine, depending on the season, to get the required residual at the far reaches.
And yes, I'm very sure cost benefit was a much more determining factor than public health.
Although the Legionaires disease scare of 1976 pushed many hold out water suppliers into using chloramine.
The lasting residual it creates (compared only straight chlorine), seems to help prevent the legionella bacteria from growing in water cooled air-conditioning system reservoirs.

 

[RD.]

I add water directly to the tank, and unlike Duane I generally perform massive water changes, so simply allowing my bio to neutralize the free ammonia produced with a residual of 2 ppm chloramine, is not something that I would recommend, especially with tap water with higher pH values, such as mine. (typically pH 8.0) I also have no plants in my tank, and from my testing over the years using a water conditioner such as Prime or Safe seems safer to the tank inhabitants, than having them exposed to trace amounts of NH3 every time I do a water change.

Yeah I would love to believe that the switch to chloramine was all about public safety, but I think we all know that isn't the case.