Dirtbag
I don’t play dat
- Joined
- May 22, 2023
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that would be the best option. instead of pulling water from the faucet, running it through the plants, then dumping the runoff + the dehuey water, could recycle all of that endless cycles. those UV sterilizers (at least good ones) aren't cheap though. would have to rework where I have my "power" center too so I could do that. not a terrible problem to have and likely the best solution.
Best thing is you can reuse both the runoff nutrient solution along with dehu water if you UV treat it. Add some fresh top off water, some fresh nutrients... very little waste. Almost no wasted nutes or water.
I've seen concerns online about UV treating nutrients, but in a rockwool setup that is getting top up water and fresh nutes each res and only briefly passing through the UV infrequently, it's not a problem at all. UV is only bad if the nutrient solution is recirculated through it constantly like in a dwc or nft system.
Thats how i ran my shed for a while before i took a break. Combined with H2O2 AFTER passing through the UV, it's an excellent way to keep the system clean.
If you add H2O2 BEFORE the UV filter, it violently catalyses the peroxide reaction, which makes very clean water but it doesn't offer any lasting protection against bacterial or fungal infection in the res, irrigation lines or the slab.
If you go for UV, get one with a decent flow rate and wattage. Worth doing research on them. The rainfresh is a good standard unit.
And you need to pre-filter the water down in a couple steps, I used a 5 micron and a 1 micron canister filter to pre-clean the runoff and dehu water before blasting with UV.