Persistent green algae, CYA 100

[joecoyle]

[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]A quote from the interwebs: Look at a piece of EU regulation called “Adaptations to Technical Progress”, specifically the 30th and 31st ATP’s. In this legislation the group of chemicals known as Borates (including Borax) were reclassified as “[/FONT]Reprotoxic Category 2[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]“. This classification suggests that the product is harmful to the reproductive functions of humans in high doses, and means the substance must carry the skull and crossbones symbol. The reclassification came about because of a study carried out on pregnant rats who were exposed to high doses of borates [1]. The study suggests that Boric Acid is harmful when exposed regularly to concentrations of more that 5.5%."[/FONT]

[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]So it would appear I have pregnant rats to blame (and the EU) for the lack of borax! I guess if I swallow a kilo of borax I could see it being toxic. But other than that its just bureaucratic nonsense!


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[Pool Amateur]

Thanks for the info never heard of that before, will keep my ears opened though. Europe is many times ahead of the US in regulating things, sometimes unnecessarily but sometimes for very good reasons.

 

[needsajet]

The amount of borax used for raising pH is small and will not cause a pool to require borate monitoring, so no worries on that score. Soda ash is also fine, but with a higher rise in TA caused by soda ash than by borax. Aeration only raises pH. All methods are fine

 

[joecoyle]

Aeration might be a problem since I have no jets or water features. But as I say I can stick with soda Ash for now until if / when we leave the EU and reverse the anti-borax law haha

 

[Demegrad9]

This interested me a bit, so I looked around and it does appear this is more political than anything. And this quote above suggest harmful concentrations are around 5.5%. The general recommendation here for borates in pool water is ~40ppm, or 0.004%, please correct me if I'm wrong.