Water well hydro fracturing

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A

AJP

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My recently drilled 170+ foot well is not producing much more than a gallon/minute according to the driller who recommends hydro fracturing. Driller has a solid reputation - you might say he is well regarded:D. Has anyone had experience with this technique? Luck? Recommendations? comments? Help?... thanks!! Is there an easy, accurate way to measure the "flow" ... would be nice to verify the before and after condition reliably....
 
Been thinking of a cistern as one option as you suggest... would act as a large holding tank and give me a buffer. Could go deeper but the cost of setting up the rig is the same as the fracturing and the driller advises that he frequently encounters "salt" at around 250 ... which loses even the gallon I am getting now.

My driller does the fracturing but uses a "single pack" set-up ... another charges about 50% more but uses a double pack. Unfortunately his guarantee is only another gallon ... which still leaves me with a pretty poor well.
 
Talk to Mace her on MUD. He helped me design my cistern (3500 gallon) setup for my poor performing well. Works like a champ now.
 
What did they drill into? Hydrofracturing only works in competant formations. Typicaly it is used in hard rock wells that have multiple fractures. All hydrofracturing can do is break up the formation a bit more (in the vicinity of the borehole) and allow more of the local fractures to feed into the well bore.

Did he hydrofracture any of the other houses around you? benefit?

Have they cased the well yet?

1 gpm? wow..

As for flow measurment. Easiest way is to fill a 5 gall bucket and time it. If it takes 5 mins to fill a 5 gal bucket, you know you are at 1 gpm. The other aspect you need to look at when doing this is the amount of drawdown. If the well has not been pumped in a while it is considered staic. That is your baseline depth to water. When you turn the pump on the water in the well bore drops. The flow rate that you pump the well at divided by the water level drop in the casing is called the specific capacity of the well. It is basicaly the well efficiency. A very easy way to identify the performance of a well independant of the pump.

Your driller have a water level monitoring device? (typicaly a tape measure on a reel that beeps when it hits water.)
 
one other thing. Even if the driller hits poorer quality water deeper. They can always run a cement plug and block off the lower portion of the well.

1 gpm sucks. even if you turned on the well and left it on, you would only get 1440gals/day. If you irrigate or have a wife/daughter who loves long showers you can use that up rapidly. And, it is possible that the well is not sustainable for any period of time (if you are drawing off of a select set of fractures you can dewater them and get even less water than 1 gpm.)


You might as well set up a rain collection device ;)
 
Thanks Mace...

What did they drill into?

the well is about 4 miles from this ...."batholith, a large deep-seated body of intrusive igneous rock consisting of coarse-grained granite rock." ......about 5 feet down on my property it is pretty much granite - might be some shale and assorted other hard stuff ...(I am on the East shore of Lake Superior) .. the well is about 70 feet from the shoreline ... I won't need much rain to water the lawn :)


Did he hydrofracture any of the other houses around you? benefit?

he does it but didn't mention doing it in my immediate area.


Even if the driller hits poorer quality water deeper. They can always run a cement plug and block off the lower portion of the well.

... didn't know this. It occurs to me that despite the technical jargon around fracturing ... I am convinced it is an inexact science.... for example unless the hole was double packed - what stops the pressure from fracturing down (into the salt) as well as out to the sides.


Have they cased the well yet?

yes but not sure how deep it goes.


1 gpm? wow..

according to the driller (yes .. wow) .. he says normally sees 5-8gpm in well in the area


As for flow measurment. Easiest way is to fill a 5 gall bucket and time it

yes... still trying to get my head around how to deal with the static head in order to measure the wells true capability


Much appreciate any guidance you can provide... best regards!!


 
AJP said:
Thanks Mace...

What did they drill into?

the well is about 4 miles from this ...."batholith, a large deep-seated body of intrusive igneous rock consisting of coarse-grained granite rock." ......about 5 feet down on my property it is pretty much granite - might be some shale and assorted other hard stuff ...(I am on the East shore of Lake Superior) .. the well is about 70 feet from the shoreline ... I won't need much rain to water the lawn :)


Did he hydrofracture any of the other houses around you? benefit?

he does it but didn't mention doing it in my immediate area.


Even if the driller hits poorer quality water deeper. They can always run a cement plug and block off the lower portion of the well.

... didn't know this. It occurs to me that despite the technical jargon around fracturing ... I am convinced it is an inexact science.... for example unless the hole was double packed - what stops the pressure from fracturing down (into the salt) as well as out to the sides.


Have they cased the well yet?

yes but not sure how deep it goes.


1 gpm? wow..

according to the driller (yes .. wow) .. he says normally sees 5-8gpm in well in the area


As for flow measurment. Easiest way is to fill a 5 gall bucket and time it

yes... still trying to get my head around how to deal with the static head in order to measure the wells true capability


Much appreciate any guidance you can provide... best regards!!
Click to expand...

Granite can be a pretty good water bearing unit if it is fractured. If it is not fractured, or the fractures are healed, you have a pretty glass of water. Hydrofracturing only works within a few feet of the borehole. so if the area you are in truly sucks, It won't help much at all. I believe that the Driller is not trying to fleece you. He is offering to try something to make your well produce a bit more. 1 gpm tho.. Wow.. even 2 gpm, I am not sure is worth it. That is a VERY low producing well. Even for a domestic residence.

Hydrofracturing only gives access to nearby fractures, if there aren't any available, it will not help. It is far from an exact science. Drillers also tend to use a sledge hammer to solve problems ;)

If the well is fully cased, hydrofracturing does not do much IMHO. you need to seal the pressure up against the formation.

Wells

nice little primer on specific capacity.


Can't you run a line into the lake for water and use a filter system of some sort??? :D
 
thanks for the link .. excellent! (scored perfect on the well questions...thanks to the internet and your help)

I agree the driller isn't trying to fleece me - I am sure he would be very pleased for the reference if he brought in a "gusher" for me. More than any other situation - "you pays your money..and takes your chances" ... somewhat frustrating looking at the largest body of fresh (and still pretty clean) water in the world ..lapping at the shore 70 feet away... and despite drilling 170 feet of granite ....no water!!:crybaby:

I like the lake idea....but pretty sure it is frowned on! Still ....I can send the wife down to beat the laundry on rocks in the morning.

One of the great pleasures in life for me is wandering down to the shore in the morning and pissing into the lake...confident (and somewhat pleased) in the knowledge that in two weeks some of my friends in Toronto will be drinking it!

I beginning to lean towards a combination of a filter; buried hose, cistern/storage tank; and a stick of DM12 lowered to about 150ft down the well.


any other thoughts/advice VERY welcome.. THANKS!!
 
AJP said:
thanks for the link .. excellent! (scored perfect on the well questions...thanks to the internet and your help)

I agree the driller isn't trying to fleece me - I am sure he would be very pleased for the reference if he brought in a "gusher" for me. More than any other situation - "you pays your money..and takes your chances" ... somewhat frustrating looking at the largest body of fresh (and still pretty clean) water in the world ..lapping at the shore 70 feet away... and despite drilling 170 feet of granite ....no water!!:crybaby:

I like the lake idea....but pretty sure it is frowned on! Still ....I can send the wife down to beat the laundry on rocks in the morning.

One of the great pleasures in life for me is wandering down to the shore in the morning and pissing into the lake...confident (and somewhat pleased) in the knowledge that in two weeks some of my friends in Toronto will be drinking it!

I beginning to lean towards a combination of a filter; buried hose, cistern/storage tank; and a stick of DM12 lowered to about 150ft down the well.


any other thoughts/advice VERY welcome.. THANKS!!
Click to expand...


I have put explosives down a well before :D

Didn't help the unit I was in (cemented gravels)


look into a straw into the lake.
 
I had about 1gpm for years, Actually I had two wells about 50 feet apart that seemed to be hydraulicly connected, and to a couple neighbor's wells too. When my neighbor topped off his pool from his 450' well, I went dry.

The first round of solutions was to add a second pressure tank to the system, knowing that this doubles the in-house capacity prior to pumping from either well, and I could cut it out if a drought. Then I put in a sequential switch that automatically switched between each well after pumping. A larger cistern would have been the best, except that I could not fill it. The keys were to maximize the storage capacity outside the well and extend the time between pumps to allow maximum recharge. It worked great for years, and then I had a driller set up and drill down deeper. Ten feet down was a gusher source. I had him drill another 100' (hit a couple more sources) and then put the pump back in to the original 175. Never a problem since.
 
The well driller should know, but you might want to check on the rules and regulations on hydro fracturing in your area. We had discussed that here, but there were disclosures and permissions needed from neighbors first. Fracturing could introduce bad things to an otherwise clean water supply, such as not completely filtered septic waste.
 
You need 3 gpm around here to get a building permit. Typically they do at least 300 feet to hit some fractures and act as a small storage tank so the pump is not on a lot.

70 feet from Lake Superiot and 1 gpm--damn that is some solid rock
 
Thanks folks.... still researching the local wells to see how much they are producing and what depth. I'm thinking that the options in priority are:
a) drill another 130 feet to about 300 (got to validate the salt issue and remediation if any)
b) hydro fracture
c) cistern and/or inhouse storage tank(s)



Yes ... it is solid rock .... The "Soo" was the center of Pangaea (the original Super continent) before it split and created the various continents.....it's had a long time to get hard! so to speak
 
Have the driller drill an angle hole below the lakebottom 50ft. or so.:D
 
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