To carbon or not to carbon?

[Jungle-mania]

I have notice that almost all the quality filters out there come with activated carbon, but I am wondering is it necessary for a healthy tank? I have always been told that it should only be used after treatment to clear the water, however I recalled activated carbon is to remove minute organic material not chemicals. I have tried with 2 tank with and without removing the carbon, little difference is noticed, except that perhaps with the carbon, it is alittle cleaner in clarity. Advise would appreciated.

[Shadow]

I'm using activated carbon only to filter the tap water. I did not use it in my filter becasue I'm afraid that it will affect my fertelizer. Futhermore activated carbon need to be change regularly.

Below info taken from Wiki

Water contaminants that
can be reduced to acceptable standards
by activated carbon filtration.
(Water Quality Association, 1989)
---------------------------------------
Primary Drinking Water Standards
Contaminant *MCL, mg/L
---------------------------------------
Inorganic Contaminants
Organic Arsenic Complexes 0.05
Organic Chromium Complexes 0.05
Mercury (Hg+2) Inorganic 0.05
Organic Mercury Complexes 0.002

Organic Contaminants
Benzene 0.005
Endrin 0.0002
Lindane 0.004
Methoxychlor 0.1
1,2-dichloroethane 0.005
1,1-dichloroethylene 0.007
1,1,1-trichloroethane 0.200
Total Trihalomethanes (TTHMs) 0.10
Toxaphene 0.005
Trichloroethylene 0.005
2,4-D 0.1
2,4,5-TP (Silvex) 0.01
Para-dichlorobenzene 0.075

---------------------------------------
Secondary Drinking Water Standards
Contaminant **SMCL
---------------------------------------
Color 15 color units
Foaming Agents (MBAS) 0.5 mg/L
Odor 3 threshold
odor number
---------------------------------------
*Maximum Contaminant Level
**Secondary Maximum Contaminant Level

[valice]

Interestingly, if you look at the composition of filter media in ADA's filter in the Style of ADA book, you see that Amano actually use quite alot of activated carbon in his filter. And he just leaves it there!

And apparently, the rationale is that NA carbon is capable of sucking up alot of the initial exceed nutrients in a new setup and then slowly releases these nutrients back to the water. In addition, according to those trained by Amano himself, the NA carbon is porous. Hence, it becomes a biological filter media as well.

[Shadow]

hm... insteresting, never think of it as a reservoir. Wonder if it is work for other activated carbon beside NA.

[Aeon]

Amano usually uses Bamboo Charcoal in the initial setup of the tanks to absorb excessive nutrients when the plants have just been planted and have not fully acclimatized and rooted. When plants have acclimatized the charcoal is replaced with Bio Rio (Bio media).

[bossteck]

Pardon me, what does the NA in this case refer to?

It is indeed interesting to think of carbon as a reservior, I guess the only worry is whether the release of nutrients when the carbon is saturated is indeed a slow release of a massive one-time release.

[valice]

Was referring to this.

[Aeon]

ADA always refer NA to "Nature Aquarium" or the A culd mean "Activated" for the Carbon
Their website adana.jp also means Aqua Design Amano Nature Aquarium

[bossteck]

Thanks guys for the clarification.

Well, the idea of having a nutrient reservoir sounds great, however, how could one know when the reservoir is full and is starting to release what was stored back into the tank, at the same time, dosing of fertilizer is continued during the same time leading to over provision of nutrients.

[Shadow]

Same concern here. When the carbon start leaking nutrient, does it mean that we overdose the fert? nutrient from dossing + from carbon.

Or maybe Amano trying to say that using activated carbon is not as dangerous as everybody think.

[Jungle-mania]

So then, is it impossible to conclude the effectiveness and safety of leaving the charcoal in there? I have seen many tanks with the charcoal left in there for eons and nothing ever goes wrong, yet when they remove it for no reason, everything that can go wrong does go wrong. On the other side of the coin, I have also seen tanks with no use of charcoal. I have come across 3 types of methodolgy of use.

A. Leave it there for good.
B. Change every 3 to 6 months.
C. Use after medication.

Of the 3, A is the most common method I have seen in matured tanks.

[Shadow]

hm.. maybe create poll to find out from others.

I was afraid using carbon becasue:
1) effecting my dossing regime
2) it may absorb and then leak unwanted chemical

Reading this thread made me thing, that using carbon not really that bad.

Anyone know what is the rate of the chemical (fert) leak to the water? Does the process of absorbing and releasing a cycle? What I mean is does carbon absorb fert (Chemical) until its limit then start releasing it slowly until empty and start absorbing again.

[Aeon]

Once the concentration within the charcoal exceeds the concentration in the water, it starts to diffuse out. Vice Versa.

That's what I think.

[Quixotic]

When in doubt, google and wikipedia are your best friends!

Actually, AC does not absorb "pollutants", but adsorbs. Adsorption is different from absorption.

An interesting article about activated carbon in the marine tank, probably no different from a planted tank, including how adsorption works.
http://www.hallman.org/filter/gac.html

Looks credible as comparing with what is on wikipedia.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Activated_carbon
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adsorption

I think the fact that there are different grades and not all activated carbon products are equal in performance, confuses the usage in the aquaria, especially when aquarists have "bad" experiences with them.

[Shadow]

haha, first time I heard the word adsorption "process that occurs when a gas or liquid solute accumulates on the surface of a solid". I was using the wrong word all along

[jellydot72]

Hi Folks,

I am using the NA carbon. It been almost a month on my mature tank. No problem till now (base on physical assessment). It can also help remove oily surface which can limit light penetration. Let it floats around and remove it after it does its job. I did not try it but info in ADA catalogue. Got my from Tokyo not $x (I think around $18 for a box)don't know how much it cost here though