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Castle Pines North might get 3 wells for price of 1
A new type of water well now being drilled in Castle Pines North might help the local water district avoid drilling two or three wells in the future.
By By:Sean Hadden
Being drilled in Coyote Park near Hidden Point Boulevard, it is known as a directional well, and instead of boring vertically through the ground to the bottom of the Denver Basin's Arapahoe aquifer, it will curve toward the top of the aquifer, then slice through it diagonally, said Castle Pines North Metropolitan District Manager Judy Dahl.
The drilling of the directional well is scheduled to be finished in late April, a press release from the district said.
But other infrastructure must be completed before its water can be distributed throughout the district, so it will not benefit customers during the upcoming summer irrigation season, the release said.
The directional well will connect to a just-completed vertical well, she said.
The water collected from the aquifer by the directional well will be pumped to the surface through the vertical well, Dahl said.
In theory, the directional well will be able to collect more water because of the way it passes through the aquifer at an angle, the release said.
This is because more of the well's water-collecting pipe will be exposed to the aquifer's water-bearing sandstone, the release said.
The vertical well contacts the water-bearing rock for roughly 600 feet, a diagram released by the district illustrates.
But the directional well will be exposed to the aquifer for about 1,500 feet, the diagram shows.
So, in theory, it should be able to collect almost three times as much water.
"We are very excited about this project because we believe it will increase production without the need to drill several additional vertical wells to keep up with demands of our peak season," Dahl said.
"We don't know that, but we hope the increased pumping capacity will eliminate the need for a couple of Denver [aquifer] wells," she said.
The estimated cost of drilling the vertical well to the bottom of the aquifer $640,000, she said.
The directional well's cost is estimated to be about $840,000, Dahl said.
For the same reason the directional well should collect more water than a vertical well, it also has greater potential for recharging the aquifer, Dahl said.
The well's longer contact with the water bearing rock makes it more practical to recharge, or put water back into the aquifer, she said.
During wet years, water from other sources could be used to replace water taken from the aquifer, Dahl said.
At this point, it is not clear how such recharging would be done, she said.
"That we really don't know," Dahl said.
The directional well will provide an opportunity to learn how an aquifer responds to recharging, said Theresa Jehn-Dellaport of Jehn Water Consultants, a Denver firm assisting the district with the well.
Recharging would probably require pumping the water downward by way of the well to the desired location, said Bob Raynolds, a Denver Basin stratigrapher with the Denver Museum of Nature and Science.
A stratigrapher maps layers of sedimentary rock, Raynolds said.
"If you're recharging, you're stuffing water back in," he said. "Stuffing that water back in is not trivial."
Directional drilling started in the oil exploration industry, but is just now being applied to water wells, he said.
"This is one of the first [directional water wells] in the area," Raynolds said. "It's innovative."
The drilling of the directional well is scheduled to be finished in late April, a press release from the district said.
But other infrastructure must be completed before its water can be distributed throughout the district, so it will not benefit customers during the upcoming summer irrigation season, the release said.
The directional well will connect to a just-completed vertical well, she said.
The water collected from the aquifer by the directional well will be pumped to the surface through the vertical well, Dahl said.
In theory, the directional well will be able to collect more water because of the way it passes through the aquifer at an angle, the release said.
This is because more of the well's water-collecting pipe will be exposed to the aquifer's water-bearing sandstone, the release said.
The vertical well contacts the water-bearing rock for roughly 600 feet, a diagram released by the district illustrates.
But the directional well will be exposed to the aquifer for about 1,500 feet, the diagram shows.
So, in theory, it should be able to collect almost three times as much water.
"We are very excited about this project because we believe it will increase production without the need to drill several additional vertical wells to keep up with demands of our peak season," Dahl said.
"We don't know that, but we hope the increased pumping capacity will eliminate the need for a couple of Denver [aquifer] wells," she said.
The estimated cost of drilling the vertical well to the bottom of the aquifer $640,000, she said.
The directional well's cost is estimated to be about $840,000, Dahl said.
For the same reason the directional well should collect more water than a vertical well, it also has greater potential for recharging the aquifer, Dahl said.
The well's longer contact with the water bearing rock makes it more practical to recharge, or put water back into the aquifer, she said.
During wet years, water from other sources could be used to replace water taken from the aquifer, Dahl said.
At this point, it is not clear how such recharging would be done, she said.
"That we really don't know," Dahl said.
The directional well will provide an opportunity to learn how an aquifer responds to recharging, said Theresa Jehn-Dellaport of Jehn Water Consultants, a Denver firm assisting the district with the well.
Recharging would probably require pumping the water downward by way of the well to the desired location, said Bob Raynolds, a Denver Basin stratigrapher with the Denver Museum of Nature and Science.
A stratigrapher maps layers of sedimentary rock, Raynolds said.
"If you're recharging, you're stuffing water back in," he said. "Stuffing that water back in is not trivial."
Directional drilling started in the oil exploration industry, but is just now being applied to water wells, he said.
"This is one of the first [directional water wells] in the area," Raynolds said. "It's innovative."
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