Bore Hole /Well Costs?

[Gone West]

14 hours ago, patp said:

I presume that this is because it was drilled just to water the garden and it was thought that the amount abstracted did not warrant it being registered.

 

14 hours ago, patp said:

This begs the question of should it be registered? If so, how does one go about reporting an unregistered borehole?

IIRC you are not required to register a borehole. We supplied our borehole details to the BGS who put it on the register.

[patp]

Anyone know how we would go about measuring the flow of water coming from the borehole?

[Onoff]

15 minutes ago, patp said:

Anyone know how we would go about measuring the flow of water coming from the borehole?

 

See how long it takes to fill an X litre container and work out the litres per minute. Bigger container is going to be more accurate. Do it a few times to get an average.

[patp]

Well (ha ha), we have had "words" with the owner of the property from which the artesian well emanates. On a chance encounter, I introduced the subject of the flow emanating from it and posed the question that she might like to cap it. She was quite indignant (she has history) and informed me that it would cost her £30,000 to get it capped. Yes you read that right.

 

We met again this morning whilst out for our dog walk. We gently broached the subject of her leaking artesian well when discussion turned to the fact that there had been some local gardens flooded, due to the ditches being unable to cope with the volume of water in them. I stated that her artesian well was not helping matters as it flowed into said ditches. She is adamant that we are wrong and as the discussion escalated she decided that the problem was all our fault because we had not informed her of how fast the water was now flowing before now. We tried to persuade her that the capping should not cost anywhere near the figure she says she has been quoted. I informed her that the local farmer who had helped sort the latest overwhelmed ditch problem estimated the cost to cap the well at about £2  -3,000. Her answer was that they must be "cowboys" if they only charge that much! Voices were raised but she would not budge from her stance that it was all our fault because we did not inform her, previously, about the amount of water flowing into our property. This even though she sees it come out of the ground and through a new "water feature" that she has created before making its way into our property..

 

We had an estate agent come to value the property and his advice was to annex the pond and "stream" into our new build garden as viewers of the existing house would be put off by the amount of water running at the bottom of their garden. We hadn't really wanted to do this as it all takes maintenance. Then we would have the problem of it detracting from any potential sale of the new bungalow.

 

Does anyone have any idea how much capping an artesian well would cost?

 

If we go to law will it have to be declared on the disclosure documents when we sell?

[joe90]

42 minutes ago, patp said:

If we go to law will it have to be declared on the disclosure documents when we sell?

As far as I know any neighbour disputes have to be declared when selling.

[Gus Potter]

Hello patp.

 

It may be worth while doing a bit of research to try and understand what the causes are for the flow rate. This may help you get a handle on the possible capping costs. Once you have a bit more information then it may be that you are in a better position to persuade. In some ways your neighbour may reassured and engage. They are maybe just wary / defensive at the possible cost implication, hence the response you are getting. It may be that they are able to recoupe any cost from their insurer. While it may seem a bit late in the day you may be able to resolve this.

 

If you are willing to spend a bit of time (it can also be fun), then you may reap some reward, if not then all you may lose is some time.

 

For all. Very simplistically an artesian effect can occur when you are near say near the bottom of a hill. The rain falls on the hill, soaks into the ground and makes it's way down to the bottom where it often goes into a river / stream (burn). If the soil is pretty much all the same at some locations the water that has soaked in at the top will come to the surface lower down and can be seen as small springs during heavy rain. You often see this when you are out for a walk after heavy rain. However, what can happen is that say halfway down the hill there is maybe some glacial material (call it clay) which forms a waterproof layer over the underlying soil.

 

Here the water that has fallen on the top of the hill gets trapped under this "clay layer" and as you go down the hill the pressure builds up as the water can't easily get to the surface. If you drill a hole in the ground as maybe in Patp's case being at the bottom of a slope and puncture the "waterproof" layer, then you can get this artesian effect.

 

There are other ways this can happen where you have say rock. Generally " solid" rock (granite say) does not transmit water but the rock has fractures in it and it is the frequency and size of these fractures that can convey different amounts of water. This can also, but less common, can manifest as an artesian effect. Mostly it crops up when tunneling, and basements!

 

Bearing the above principles in mind you could again separate this into two (I'll leave out rock strata - Chalk, limestones etc and concentrate on clay type soils) . Patp, Is it a case where you have a thin layer of clay and not much of a slope.. this would suggest lots of low pressure water but plenty flow or a thick layer of clay, more elevation, small puncture hole and lots of pressure? Much will also depend on the type of clay and you can find info on this too. If you have a fine clay then this can wash out more quickly and so on..don't despair just follow the logic.

 

One way patp can get a handle on this is to draw in section the landscape (refer to OS map say) , just  roughly. Then have a look here ,see link, below for a learning resource.

 

http://mapapps.bgs.ac.uk/geologyofbritain/home.html

 

The above will give you a rough idea what the ground might be like and compare this with the OS map that shows the contours of the ground.

 

Also, have a look on the council web site for info, COVID excepted your local BCO will be familiar with the ground, ask them. Have a look at the old historical maps that are available online. Even as a lay person you can build a picture of what may be likely going on under the ground. What you are doing is akin to a desktop study. Save all the info you gather as if you need to get an Enginneer in you may well find that you have done some of the leg work for them. 

 

It sounds like patp may have a situation where there is indeed some kind of clay, (really fractured, weathered, soft surface rock ?) acting as the sealing layer trapping the water. Over time the water flow will have eroded the "clay", the hole has got bigger as the soft fine material get progressively washed out, thus more water is coming out the ground as patp is observing.

 

To cap this may well entail two different methods depending on what water pressure / flow rate you have, how much the original bore has open up by and so on.

 

I'll stop here with the background info, but in summary with a bit of research on your own and while you may not be able to solve all of it you will much more informed when it comes to making the financial judgements and often, this will give you piece of mind that you are on the right track, maybe also save some money!

 

Patp. This is a guess here but it looks more like a situation where the flow is increasing as you have some kind of soft material / lower water pressure (hydrostatic) that is being eroded rather than a high pressure with rock. If the former, it may be that you, as the other members have suggested may be able to just pump in some "bentonite" which is a kind of a heavy/ dense "sticky",  "clay" type material to seal (gunge) it up.. Bentonite generally works as it is dense and does not go hard like concrete, which then shrinks.

 

While you could try and pump in concrete all that may happen is that within a short time the water will find it's way round the concrete plug and you will be worse off as you have blocked up the hole with concrete and can't access the "leak" in the water proof layer"

 

For all.. Just to finish. It may well be worth while this effort. You may be lucky and get your neighbour to engage and move on with no ill will. If not then you will have a much better grasp of the situation, be more familiar with the geotechnical terms and so on should you, after exhausting all other options, need to proceed down a more formal, route.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited January 16, 2021 by Gus Potter
typos.. left handed!

[patp]

We live in good old, flat as a pancake, Norfolk. We have on our existing property an artesian well. From memory (!), when I looked it up, the water spouted to, I think, 46 metres when they drilled it about 80 or so years ago. Ours has a tap on it and has never leaked. The well belonging to our neighbour is no more than a couple of hundred yards from us. They had it drilled to irrigate their garden about 20 odd years ago and it leaked from day one. At that time I would say it ran at the speed of a quarter open domestic tap. Our neighbours apologised about it but at that speed we were not concerned and it kept our natural pond topped up in the summer  Since then the flow has increased and increased and now draws attention from anyone passing anywhere near it. 

 

We had a visit from Anglian Water engineers over our new build and one looked at the flow and estimated it must be running at around 2 litres per second. He was incredulous that Environment Agency were not interested in addressing the matter. We were later told that EA quite like these situations as the water makes its way to the rivers and keeps them clean. This water is contaminated with iron oxide. Our own well, when it was drilled, was said to contain iron oxide too. The two wells are almost certainly from the same source. If our drilling spouted to 46 metres then you can tell the pressure of the leak!

 

I think that the neighbour may have been quoted a high figure to cap the well because they did not want to lose their water source. I would imagine it is a much more complicated job to cap it and keep the supply pipe flowing ???

[patp]

Just pulled up the old certificate, on line, of our bore hole and the bore was 120 ft in all. 80 ft to Clay and 40 ft to chalk. It was a 4 inch bore. The rest level of water was 30 feet not 46 metres ha ha! The neighbours one must be virtually the same.

[patp]

Some good news. I have been messaging our farmer neighbour, as he knows a drilling company, and has also had dealings with the neighbour in question. He tells me that he has had an email from her asking for the details of said drilling company! 

 

If the Anglian Water bod's guestimate of 2 litres per second was in the right ball park how much would our neighbour owe AW if they charge £27.50 per 1000 cubic litres per annum?

[patp]

Just to update the above. I wrote to complain about the "statutory nuisance"  (thanks for the tip) and to point out that she probably owes EA twenty years worth of fees that are probably around £1,700 pa for extraction fees. I included all our other problems caused by the influx of water not least the risk of flooding and loss of property value.

 

She wrote back to, once again, accuse us of  not complaining previously! Two pages of accusations aimed at us but the last (3rd) page notified us that she was getting quotes for capping the blooming thing!!! I think the EA fees were the deciding factor to be honest. I am glad I remembered how to look for registered bore holes which was another tip I learned on here.