Every water well driller has to face this nightmare and this tough job one time or another. Of tell his customer the sad news of no water or very little water was found. Even after spending days of drilling, until the hole reached the depth and beyond the customer's budget. What do you do now? As for the customer, here is this hole in the ground. With only the visible part of the hole which represents the efforts and money spend. Is the short length of steel casing sticking above the ground level.

If the hole was drilled into overburden, such as clays and other kinds of overburden formations, laying above the bedrock.. Then there is a good chances the hole could be deepen at a later date. When more funding was available.

This would be considered a good choice, providing the standard primarily investigations were done. Previous to the beginning of the drilling program. The standard investigations being, does the neighbour have a drilled well supplying water. Then the questions would be, how deep and how much water and how far is it away from your location. Another excellent choice would be to consult with local government departments, who are in charge of groundwater.

Another prefect solution, is the hiring of groundwater consulting firms. Groundwater consulting firms are being used more each day. Groundwater consulting firms using their background knowledge of an area are helping property owners to achieve successful water supplies.

Credit also has to be given to the local drilling firms. Who after many years has gather tremendous experience and knowledge. Of the groundwater in their area. Both the groundwater consulting firm and the local drilling company may work together to supply joint expertise to complete a water well project.

What about holes in bedrock? If bedrock was encountered within the early stages of the drilling program. And the hole was continued down into the bedrock. Until the formation became quite hard for the drill bits to penetrate. Or the drilling budget was exhausted. What to do now?

Not all is lost yet. Here again primarily investigation would play a major role in the decision making. Just because the hole is in bedrock does not mean, you are completely shut out of have a groundwater supply of water. Many water wells in the world are in bedrock and producing water each day. Many of the bedrock water wells, date back as far as biblical times. The most important thing regarding bedrock water wells, is the type of rock they are drilled or dug into.

The sedimentary group of rocks are one of the top water producing rocks. Especially the groups of sedimentary rock form from mechanical methods. Such as depositing by water, weather and erosion. Most sandstone fall within this category. Because of its porous makeup, sandstone can store large volumes of water and release the same at a great rate. Limestone are another aquifer that could produce large volumes of water. Limestone don't solely depend on its porous to hold and produce water. In fact the porous in limestone is very low. But, rather the water in limestone are held and travels through interconnecting cracks or tunnels, which has been eroded by water itself. The remain of the more common sedimentary rocks, like shale and conglomerates, depends on the cracking or shifting of the earth's crust, before they become water producers.

The two other rock groups, igneous and metamorphic its a toss up as to what one is the better aquifer. They both depend on weathering, faulting, cracking or fracturing to produce water. And the majority of the weathering and cracking is within the first three hundred feet of the surface. Most of the wells drilled into these kind of rock groups, end up to be small producers. Some of them as low as drops per hour.

Property owners can sustain a live-on residence on property with these low producing water wells. Storage tanks and extra pumping systems are required and should be installed.

Holes and water wells drilled into solid rock formation, are never cased. But are left as open holes. The holes through the overburden are slightly oversize and drilled to the bedrock, and into the bedrock a safe distance. Casing is then installed and seated to bottom in the oversized hole. Generally a mixture of cement or a sealant is used to seal the outside area around the casing. The drilling is then continued in the rock and the hole or water well is left open. Meaning there is no casing installed to bottom of the hole.

A system which has advanced to increase the water flow from these low yielding water wells within the last few years is hydrofracturing. What is hydrofracturing? A system using ideas from the oil well and oil producing companies. For years in the oil business, companies have been fracturing oil wells to increase the flow. Using high pressure pumps and down the hole packer systems. The packer system generally two of them are set at predetermine depth in the hole. Fluid is then pumped in the hole underneath the top packer and is held back by the bottom packer. The high pressure pump keeps pumping until there is a high pressure fluid body between the two packers. The high pressure fluid body starts to destroy and break the rock formation and opening up passage ways allowing more crude oil or gases to enter the well.

Not like the oil business the water well business does not have the same build in revenue. Therefore the drillers themselves developed a smaller system, rather than two packer. They just use one, with smaller pressure pumps. Some of the units are mounted on trucks, and others are just rig mounted hydraulic driven pumps. The rig mounted hydraulic driven pumps use the hydraulic oil pressure and flow from the rig's main pump, by way of a value bank. The packers can be mechanical or fluid activated.

To indicate the possibility of this advancement in the water well drilling field. Just recently having an input and from the, on the job knowledge. A contract for four wells for a 40 lot subdivision site was let. The site was on Bowen Island a few miles from Vancouver BC Canada. The groundwater consultant was Ed. Livingston, hydrogeologist from a local well respected firm, Pacific Hydrology Consultants Ltd of Vancouver. The drilling contractor was a many years in the business company, Tri K Drilling Ltd from Victoria BC.

The first well, an overburden well, was drilled by cable tool. Rock was encountered at 50 feet, screens were installed, and a well developed. The interesting ones are the remaining three well.

The cable tool was used to drill the surface casing up to and into the rock. The rock formation in that area is classify by Ed. Livingston as granodiorite of the Jurassic age. The granodiorite intrudes the volcanic and the sedimentary rocks of the Bowen Island group.

The second 6" diameter well was drilled by air rotary using the down the hole hammer method. The depth of the well was 355 feet. Rock was encountered at 11 feet. Surface casing was installed to 20 feet. The well was tested using the drill air, and the well yielded 1.5 gallon per minute. The static water level was determine to be 35 feet from surface. Hydrofracturing was carried out on the open rock hole. Results;

Set	Depth of Packer	Max. Pressure	Min. Pressure	Time Development	Water Yield
1	40 feet	500 psi.	450 psi.	30 minutes	no increase
2	100 feet	500 psi.	450 psi.	30 minutes	1 gpm
3	200 feet	750 psi.	550 psi.	30 minutes	3.5 gpm
4	250 feet	550 psi.	300 psi.	30 minutes	6 gpm
5	275 feet	550 psi.	300 psi.	30 minutes	10 gpm
6	325 feet	550 psi.	300 psi.	30 minutes	10 gpm

After hydrofracturing and with additional development with air the well yielded a constant 8 gpm. This is quite an increase, from 1.5 gpm to 8 gpm.

The third well, drilled to 400 feet, rock encountered at 13 feet, surface casing set to 20 feet. Using drill rig air, the well had a yielded of 2 gpm. Static water level was at 11 feet from surface. Hydrofracturing was carried out on this well with the following results.

Set	Depth of Packer	Max. Pressure	Min. Pressure	Time Development	Water Yield
1	75 feet	500 psi.	200 psi.	30 minutes	no increase
2	125 feet	300 psi.	150 psi.	30 minutes	no increase
3	250 feet	600 psi.	150 psi.	30 minutes	2 gpm
4	275 feet	1100 psi.	550 psi.	30 minutes	5 gpm
5	325 feet	550 psi.	150 psi.	30 minutes	8 gpm
6	350 feet	500 psi.	500 psi.	30 minutes	12 gpm

After hydrofracturing and with addition development with air, well yielded a constant flow of 8 gpm. This hydrofracturing increased the well yielded from 2 gpm to 8 gpm.

The fourth well drilled to 400 feet, rock encountered at 27 feet and surface casing set to 40 feet. The well yielded without hydrofracturing 15 gpm, with a static level of 6 feet from surface. After hydrofracturing the well yielded increased to 20 gpm.

Hydrofracturing this, come later technology has proven it's worth in gold. With statistics of a 80% improvement to most wells. Turning a, "Just get by," water well into a smiling success. So the days of unhappy well drillers and customers because of no water, may be far apart, if this technology is practiced.

Also this is good news to customers who has a low yielding rock well. Or rock wells which has become a non-producer after years of operation. There is always the possibility of rejuvenating and increasing the yield of this rock well. Back to a working condition, with hydrofracturing, chemical cleaning and re-developing.

Ed Elliott

NOTE: Many well drillers, are responsible for the advancement in this technology. Drillers , who took it on themselves by the making of packers and to attempt hydrofracture the wells using their mud pumps and other pumping equipment. These people are the forerunners in this idea, realizing if fracturing helps the oil producing wells, why could it not help the water wells. There must have been tremendous feeling of achievement to see their beliefs work. They deserve a marked cornerstone in the building of water well drilling technologies.