Large Capacity Well Efficiency: Food Production, Energy, and Supply Challenges: System Operation and Maintenance

Maintaining well-field productivity is critical for many municipalities facing long-term drought. Wells will clog with prolonged well operations and productivity will decline. Constituents that clog well screens, filter pack and unconsolidated aquifers include unconsolidated finer grained material filling pore spaces, chemical precipitation, and or the formation of biofilm. Typically, the conventional methods of well maintenance include mechanical, chemical, and/or a combination of these two methods. The duration for cleaning these high capacity wells is a lengthy process that takes a month or two to be completed. The time and costs for well maintenance and the lost opportunity in pumping are challenges that need to be addressed or else the well-field will become a costly program to manage and maintain. What new well technologies can be applied to reduce well maintenance and improve well efficiency? Recently, the City of Phoenix has taken a slightly different tactic in addressing well maintenance and operations. For their Aquifer Storage and Recovery Well Program, the following technologies were implemented to reduce physical and chemical clogging agents:

• Epoxy coating the pump and column pipe assembly,
• Utilizing glass beads as a filter pack media, and
• Implementing automated programming.

Through the course of design and construction of the first series of ASR well systems, these innovative technologies have provided the necessary success from both an economic and operations perspective. These new well technologies at the ASR well systems have allowed Phoenix to accomplish the following:

• Simplify the operator functions and data collection;
• Successfully unclog the well with the permanent pump after successive recharge and recovery seasons;
• Reduce labor force in operating the well system; and
• Access real-time performance data so that decisions can be made quickly.

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Meeting food production, energy, and potable water demand in the 21^st century will depend on groundwater in many parts of the world.  This multi-hour session will feature five distinct presentations on well design, well development, water use calculation, proper pump selection, and system operation and maintenance to address how the groundwater, agricultural, and energy communities can meet the challenge.