Water Well Journal
Issue link: http://read.dmtmag.com/i/608970
We wanted to prove the usefulness of the concept in as economical a way as possible, so only the most necessary equipment was installed. It was under- stood engineering upgrades and im- provements could be deferred until after the project had proved successful. Hydrogeological assessment was similarly curtailed. The regional aquifer is in the Columbia River Basalt Group and our conceptual model suggests the portion of the aquifer tapped by our well is part of but somehow isolated from the regional aquifer. Our well intercepts a zone of limited areal extent, possibly as small as a few hundred yards radius. The temptation to conduct an addi- tional investigation to understand the local zone was powerful. There were many times during the project both the consultants and regulators yearned for additional information. However, the question we had to keep asking ourselves was what actual value would knowing the geologic de- tails of our unusual aquifer provide? The interesting answer is, regardless of how much geological information could have been compiled, the project would not have performed differently. During the five-year period of a lim- ited license, we conducted standard ASR testing. Water from other system wells was pumped into and out of the receiving water aquifer. Cycles of injec- tion, storage, and discharge were con- ducted to assess the storage capacity of the aquifer and to develop operational guidelines. Analyses of the water chemistry con- firmed the receiving aquifer water qual- ity mirrored that of the source aquifer water quality. Ultimately we never dis- covered any information to explain or further define the specific geologic con- ditions causing restricted communica- tion between our ASR well and the surrounding regional aquifer. Limit the number of consultants. Two senior consultants performed all the engineering and geologic tasks. Where help in specialized technical mat- ters were needed, additional profession- als were hired on an ad hoc basis. Utilize SCADA to the maximum. The PUD had installed a supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) system a few years earlier, and addi- tional telemetry and sensors specific to the ASR project were added. By using remote desktop software, the consult- ants were able to monitor the functions of the ASR project from afar—thereby reducing the frequency of site visits. More importantly, raw data files gener- ated by SCADA could be downloaded for more sophisticated analyses. The downloads were used to create an off-site database of SCADA files that could then be queried with custom- written programs. One of the shortcomings of many SCADA systems is their reporting capa- bilities are limited. SCADA-supplied software focuses on visualization, trend- ing, and alarms—and a common com- plaint is the reporting capabilities offer few, if any, of the types of analytical tools that engineers and geologists use. WWJ December 2015 31 Twitter @WaterWellJournl SECOND USE continues on page 32 Every pumping event becomes an opportunity to quantitatively assess the efficiency of the well.