| Water Well Maintenance & Tips |
 Maintenance,
along with proper location and construction, is essential to
ensuring your drinking water is safe. Guidelines for maintaining
your well can be found on the Water Systems Council fact sheet,
Wellcare® information for you about Well
Maintenance (2 pages, pdf).
Contamination of well water supplies generally occurs when polluted
surface water or septic system discharges seep into the groundwater.
However, human activity also can play a role in unnecessary
pollution.
Practices such as yearly checkups, regular
testing and keeping household contaminants and farming chemicals a
safe distance from water supplies greatly reduce your risk from
drinking potentially unsafe or unhealthy water.
The
National Ground Water Association (NGWA)
offers an online fact sheet, Schedule Your Annual Water Well Checkup
that provides information regarding well checkups. |
|
The following tips can
be used as a guideline to help ensure your private well is properly
maintained: |
* Keep contaminants away
– Avoid mixing, using or storing hazardous chemicals, such
as paint, fertilizer, pesticides, motor oil, gas, weed killer
and other pollutants near the well.
Other online publications are offered on the University of Texas
Extension's web page is, 57 Ways to Protect Your Home
Environment (and Yourself), which includes six chapters on how
to protect your drinking water, including information on knowing
when and how to test your water and the signs of contamination.
* Don't allow back-siphonage – Use back flow prevention
devices (available at local hardware stores) on all outside
faucets with hose connections to help keep pollutants from back
siphoning into the hose.
* Visually inspect exposed parts of the well – Make sure
there are no cracks or damage to the well casing or well cap,
and the well cap fits tightly. Also, ensure the area around the
wellhead slopes away from the well, and is free of leaves, grass
and other debris. The Texas Association of Groundwater
Professionals (TAGP) offers a Water Well Owner's Guide online,
which includes checklists, tips, and information on well
records.
* Seal abandoned wells – Abandoned and improperly
constructed wells can be sources of potentially polluted
groundwater, which could make your drinking water unsafe. The
University of Texas Extension offers an online publication,
Sealing Abandoned Wells that describes the risks and guidelines
on sealing wells.
* Conserve and protect your water - Water conservation is
becoming an ever-growing necessity throughout the world today,
as the availability of drinking water constantly diminishes
through things such as drought, contamination and an increase in
population. Conserving and protecting this limited resource is
essential in ensuring an adequate supply of water for all your
needs as well as for future generations. For tips on how to
conserve water at home, visit Texas EPA's Citizens' Information
Center and the American Water Works Association's, Waterwiser
web page. Also, check out
U.S. EPA's "WaterSense: Efficiency Made
Easy" web page.
* Test, test, test! – Remember, private water well owners
themselves have the primary responsibility to test well water
for potential contaminants.
|
|
