RO excess water usage

[DongShenYin]

Can the water that's been filtered out of a RO unit be used for freshwater tanks? Or are the impurities so concentrated that it would kill the FW fish? How about mixing the excess water with tap water? Or how about using the excess water on hardwater species, like African Rift Lake cichlids?

 

[incysor]

Can the water that's been filtered out of a RO unit be used for freshwater tanks? Or are the impurities so concentrated that it would kill the FW fish? How about mixing the excess water with tap water? Or how about using the excess water on hardwater species, like African Rift Lake cichlids?

I doubt it would be a good idea to use it for any tanks. It'll still have all the chemicals and impurities that you don't want in it. But I'm not really an expert on the filters. Most folks I know that want to conserve the waste water either run a line directly to their lawn or flowerbeds, or run it to a cistern or drum that they can then use for watering purposes.

B

 

[Physh1]

I wouldn't. I've always recommended just watering the plants with it. It's hard to say how bad it would be but it wouldn't be ideal at all for fw tanks. I'd use RO for fw tanks as well. The stuff that filters pull from water isn't good for either fw or sw tanks.

Cameron

 

[Vafik]

You could use it on a Planted tank probably. It's really not pure waste that it's filtering out. An OR filter will use a lot of regular tap water to flushes the membrane out. And it wastes more water then filters water. So for every gallon of OR water it wastes like 5 gallons of plain tap water with slightly more impurities in it. Nothing to make it toxic or anything and could be used on FW tanks just fine. Just let it sit open for a day or two and add some dechlorinate to it. Actually I've heard that this would be really good for planted tanks b/c of the trace elements in the water. RO's waste a lot of water unless you have a DI system too. DI have zero water waste and are more practical if you have just a nano tank or similar smaller tanks. Remember you waste a lot of water for just one gallon of usable water.