Running cost 500 liter reef tank UK £

[Fishguy2]

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[AmyKieran]

I keep freshwater fish and have no idea about marine but I can’t imagine it’s cheap

 

[Donya]

Running costs will vary a lot with equipment and water source. You mainly need to look into prices on the following:

• RO or RODI water. If you make your own, check cost on filters, replacement time being highly dependent on your water. Usually it's DI filters that burn through fastest with bad water and can need to be replaced in as little as a few months, otherwise with a small tank maybe once per year with relatively good water. Membrane itself should last a long time. If you buy water by the gallon/litre, plan on 10-20% or so volume weekly for WC and top up.
• Salt mix if mixing your own water.
• Foods, mostly if you plan on doing frozen to feed a fish which is more costly. I have my very few fish trained to flakes. If you are dyan invert only reef this will be minimal.
• Electricity. Lights and heater will be the big sources usually. Depends what you get and how cold your room is.

At any rate, the running costs should be pretty small for a small tank relative to the setup costs. It's been a while since I've done fw but I think comparable to that for running costs alone (if you do LEDs) with a bit extra for the RO water part. The setup costs are where it greatly diverges from the average fw tank.

 

[Donya]

Ah sorry I just realized I read the title as 50L! I was thinking nanos. But you said 500, which is a lot bigger lol sorry about that. Well, most of what I said still applies but if you have to buy water for that it will be quite a bit more obviously, and you will be looking at much higher wattage other equipment. Those items I gave are the main components. If you have a LOT of hard corals (vs a softy reef) then some kind of calc/all supplement might be tacked on there as a recurring expense.

 

[Essjay]

If the water supply is metered, it could cost quite a bit making your own RO as they do waste a lot of water. But if your water costs are fixed (eg based on the rateable value) it won't cost any more to make your own - apart from buying the equipment.

 

[Donya]

If the water supply is metered, it could cost quite a bit making your own RO as they do waste a lot of water. But if your water costs are fixed (eg based on the rateable value) it won't cost any more to make your own - apart from buying the equipment.

Good point! Having been on well water for a couple years I forgot about the costs of being on metered water. Amount of water wasted is dependent on the membrane, but also heavily impacted by water pressure and water quality. Sometimes you can boost the efficiency of an RO unit with an extra pressurizing unit (I have to use one of those now due to low water pressure out of the tap that was causing a ridiculous fill time and waste ratio).