Cold Water Reef Plan

[Dale]

Depends on what you call cold water.

Conventional thinking is that subtidal species from our latitude will probably need temps with an upper limit of 55*F or so. You may get away with 66*F with some hardy intertidal/tidepool species as they are used to greater temp fluctuations (but they do get a regular drop of temps when the tide comes in) while some species like the three spine stickleback can take higher temps in the mid sixties. It all comes down to livestock selection.

I toyed with the idea of keeping a tank at higher temps (without a chiller) but by now I am convinced that one is needed to knock the temps below 60*F at least. In your case a small chiller combined with reduced heat inputs and evaporative cooling might be all that is needed.