Cost savings help Lab add additional well to Recovery Act project

New wells strengthen groundwater monitoring network

Crews drill the well known as R-50, one of the wells funded by Recovery Act dollars.

September 22, 2010—Part of the $212 million in Recovery Act environmental projects at LANL was the installation of 16 groundwater monitoring wells. With the project nearing completion slightly more than a year later, nearly 10 percent of the wells budget has been saved through efficient purchasing and construction and will be used for additional projects.

Wells are expensive

Drilling groundwater monitoring wells to sample water in the regional aquifer in New Mexico is expensive—about $2 million per well. Most of the cost is due to the depth of each well—an average of 1,100 feet—and the area’s complex geology.

“The purpose of the wells is to monitor possible Lab-related contaminants in the groundwater supply,” said Ted Ball, program director. “We sample water from the wells and analyze it for a number of contaminants.”

Though each well is costly to drill and construct, Ball saved almost 10 percent of his Recovery Act project budget by buying steel in bulk and by scheduling construction to save mobilization and demobilization costs for drilling equipment. The resulting savings of about $3 million will be used to construct an additional well and to conduct a sampling survey on three wells installed several years ago.

Completing obligations

“Installing groundwater monitoring wells is part of the Lab’s Consent Order with the New Mexico Environment Department,” Ball said. “We’re completing our obligations under the Consent Order.”  The Consent Order also sets milestones for the Lab’s remediation of Manhattan Project and Cold War waste sites.

In addition to drilling an additional well, savings will be used to ensure that water samples taken from certain wells are accurate representations of “perched” aquifers-- pockets of water above the water table-- that are being sampled.

“Recovery Act funding has sped up our compliance timeline and provided jobs,” Ball said. “It’s provided both environmental and economic benefits.”

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This sketch shows an example of a deep well with two sampling points: one for perched water, and one for the regional aquifer. Artist: Dave DeLano