Installation Guide of a Monitoring Well at Gas Station
Have you been given the task of installing a monitoring well at a gas station? While these pieces of equipment may look intimidating, they’re an essential item that’s required to measure trends and determine decisions about the environment surrounding the facility.
Installing a monitoring well doesn’t have to be a complicated task. Provided you’ve got the right tools, installation is relatively simple. Plus, if you follow this guide, you’ll be up and running in no time.
What Is a Monitoring Well?
A gas station monitoring well analyzes chemical, physical, and biological properties of groundwater within an aquifer. It can also evaluate the flow direction of the groundwater.
This sampling occurs during different frequencies throughout a year. It’s often directed by federal, state, or local agencies so they can study any alterations and provide support if it’s required.
How Do You Install a Monitoring Well at a Gas Station?
Monitoring well installation uses several drilling methods. They are placed into the aquifer by using the following techniques:
- Sonic
- Hollow stern auger
- Water rotary
- Direct push
- Mud rotary
- Air rotary
Once it’s in the ground, it needs development to enhance the hydraulic flow from beneath the gas station into the well. You also need to remove inorganic or organic materials that entered the well during the construction process. Minimizing the amount of sediment in samples ensures that it’s a true representation of what’s flowing through the aquifer.
How Do You Know It’s Working?
The Environmental Protection Agency has clear expectations of what the sample quality should look like when extracted from a monitoring well. They state hat activities must continue until the water is free of any sediments and the conductivity, pH, turbidity, and temperature stabilize.
If you still notice sediment in the water, then the development of the monitoring well must continue. This can take several days, but once it’s stable, the official sample process can commence.
What Issues Can Occur if It’s Not Installed Properly?
When a monitoring well is poorly installed or developed incorrectly, it can have severe impacts. The biggest issue is that it will provide poor quality groundwater samples leading to a skewed representation of the conditions under the gas station.
This can lead to incorrect theories and conclusions about the environmental quality of the facility. In extreme cases, wrong action plans can get developed. This has impacts on the company’s finances, health and safety of operators and coworkers, and customers who use the gas station.
Need Some Extra Support?
It’s important to install a monitoring well at a gas station correctly so that accurate samples can lead to actionable results. If not, it can lead to potentially expensive and hazardous consequences.
If you want assurance that your monitoring well is installed correctly, then we can help. We’re fully licensed, have over 20 years of experience in the field, and only perform work under federal, state, and local regulations. Contact us now if you want to ensure that your monitoring well installed today.
We provide groundwater monitoring well installation for gas stations in the counties of Morris, Sussex, Hudson, Union, Mercer, Middlesex, Monmouth, Ocean, Hunterdon, Passaic, Essex, Bergen, Warren, and Somerset.
