Drilling will soon begin on a new municipal water supply well in Wolfforth, which will also be used to investigate the Edwards-Trinity (High Plains) and Dockum Aquifers in western Lubbock County.

Texas based Layne Christensen Company will begin drilling the well early next week. The entire project is expected to be completed in two weeks.

The City of Wolfforth is exploring possible use of groundwater in the Edwards-Trinity (High Plains) Aquifer for municipal use. This aquifer lies directly beneath the Ogallala, which is the primary aquifer on the Southern High Plains.

A small diameter test hole will be drilled through the Edwards-Trinity (High Plains) and Dockum aquifers to a depth of approximately 1,700 feet. The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) will then log the entire borehole using advanced technological methods.  The information from this survey provides very detailed analysis of the formations, including water quality.  After the logging is complete, the Dockum Aquifer portion of the test hole will be plugged to the base of the Edwards-Trinity (High Plains) Aquifer, which is about 300 feet below land surface.

If adequate water is located and can be produced from the Edwards-Trinity (High Plains) aquifer, the test hole will be reamed, cased and completed for use as a municipal well to increase the City of Wolfforth’s current groundwater supply. If this effort proves successful, it will be less costly than pumping water from the city’s other water rights which are located southwest of Wolfforth.

City of Wolfforth officials are working to ensure citizens have a reliable source of clean drinking water for years to come. The recently completed electro-dialysis reversal (EDR) treatment plant addresses this need.  This state-of-the-art water treatment plant went online in May 2017 and is currently serving approximately 4,600 citizens.  Officials are hopeful this test well project will increase the city’s current water supply.

The High Plains Underground Water Conservation District (HPWD) Board of Directors unanimously agreed to cost-share this exploratory well with the City of Wolfforth in early 2017. The HPWD Board agreed to allocate $90,000 to assist with the project, plus USGS logging costs.

 “The Edwards-Trinity Aquifer will hopefully provide us with a water source that will not compete with our own wells or the irrigation wells in the area,” said Wolfforth City Manager Darrell Newsom. “Our partnership with HPWD will allow us to share information with other cities in the region, and that will help all of us. HPWD’s cooperation and support will allow us to obtain much more complete data than we would be able to obtain and understand on our own.”

This is the District’s third partnership with a municipality to explore the Dockum Aquifer. In 2016, the cities of Abernathy and Lubbock, with assistance from the HPWD, drilled test wells to determine the quality and quantity of the brackish aquifer. Lubbock’s test well, located near the South Water Treatment Plant, was completed in December 2016.

“We are learning more about the Dockum Aquifer as a result of these efforts,” said HPWD General Manager Jason Coleman. “In recent years, the District has established a monitoring network in this aquifer, and these partnerships allow us to add additional data collection sites.”