After this past summer’s power outage and a recent water-main break that left Athens residents without water, the city will build a new production well in preparation for similar events in the future.
Councilman Kent Butler, D-1st Ward, introduced an ordinance authorizing the design of a new production well in the Armitage well field on Armitage Road at a special meeting for ordinances and committees March 25.
The city of Athens has three well fields: the Armitage field, the Hospital field near O’Blenness Memorial Hospital and the West State Street field.
Some of the wells in the field near the O’Blenness Memorial Hospital are beginning to fail, said Andy Stone, director of Engineering and Public Works. The new well will be built in the Armitage field because it has the highest production potential.
Each well is equipped with a steel screen that keeps smaller particles and sediments from coming up through the well, Stone said. Over time, the screen clogs and production capability drops.
“For the (wells) in the hospital fields, the screen on some of them has rusted completely through, so large material comes into the well when we pump,” Stone said. The last time a new well was installed was in 1983.
The city will rehabilitate some of the old wells and drill a new well to avoid water production and movement issues like those that occurred during the weeklong summer outage last year. The city also had to put a high demand on its fields when a main water line broke on North Congress Street in February.
“(Those two) dilemmas opened up the public works director to see the water supply from a different angle,” Butler said. “Power outages mean no electricity to work the (water) pumps.”
Stone said that in a typical day the city does not have a problem with even reduced production capacity, but the trouble comes when a significant event, like a power outage or water-line break, puts an increased demand on the system.
It will cost $32,000 to begin the construction process, Butler said at the meeting. Athens Mayor Paul Wiehl said it would cost $150,000 to drill the well, which will be put into the 2014 budget. Wiehl added that he is not sure if that cost includes any observation or monitoring of the wells.
“Recent events opened our eyes to fact that for some extreme events, we need the capability to produce two to three times the amount of water that we would use in a normal day,” Stone said. “Improvement is necessary to set Athens up for the next couple decades.”
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