CYA and Bacteria

[rdhetrick]

Another day, another random thought......

We've heard stories and seen evidence of people's CYA disappearing over the winter, and I think I remember reading that it was due to some sort of bacteria eating the CYA.

Is there anymore known about this? What if...someone could identify the bacteria and intentionally put it in a pool with high CYA - as an alternative to drain/refil?

I know, probably isn't practical, but is it possible?

 

[jblizzle]

We have often joked that someone could become a millionaire if they figured out how to do this.

One issue is that while it reduces the CYA, it also generally raises levels of other undesirables, like ammonia, which then requires massive amounts of chlorine to remove. So ... would it be cheaper to buy a product to add and then buy a lot of chlorine to remove the ammonia/CC ... or to just replace some water ???

 

[chem geek]

See Degradation of Cyanuric Acid for technical details. Unfortunately, there isn't an easy way that we know of to control the bacteria so that they degrade the CYA all the way to nitrogen gas rather than stop at ammonia. It's related to the types of bacteria and whether the conditions are aerobic or anaerobic.