@Lasse opened my mind to a better approach to carbon dosing where he feeds a reactor and monitors the effluent to adjust dosing. At least that's how I interpreted it.
Seems like the best of both worlds with Bio-pellets and dosing in that you target dose into media to get the accelerated benefits without dosing the display having less impact on co2 creation.
In place of bio-pellets fill it with a media to house bacteria then dose directly into this reactor ensuring there are detectable results to avoid hydrogen sulfide as best I understood him. Caveat being he uses a large reactor similar to my approach and not sure how small it can go. Have assumed reason I didn't see bacterial blooms even when overdosing at 2x to 5x recommended being my media was 25% total display volume.
Had looked into bio-pellets in 2015 when getting back into the hobby as nitrate maintenance part of the reason I exited due to time constraints due to life and work and it look extremely promising until I discovered carbon dosing although having not used it was still a learning curb such as it's impact on co2 and my struggles with pH I hadn't yet correlated until
@Randy Holmes-Farley made that clear to me.
This co2 impact had me once again going back to macroalgae as a means of managing that final step in aquarium decomposition but with this new learned approach to direct dosing then perhaps I can avoid the hassle of a refugium or ATS or at a minimum reduce the size of either as they still hold benefits yet dosing media which can be controlled and monitored seems more fool proof.
Food for thought on reactor size needed being one can potentially replace socks, roller mats and space needed for said refugium or ATS and flexibility in utilizing several reactors in series to provide the needed media volume required. Also adds flexibility for those lacking a sump as this can be plumbed similar to running a canister filter. Key being ability to dose directly and issue I'm still working on solving with my attempt at replicating this approach.
Plus lack the patience to wait months for pellets to start working or the potential constant tuning needed as life grows or conditions evolve.
