A client of G3SoilWorks was considering purchasing a multi-million dollar piece of property in San Antonio, Texas that allegedly contained two large springs with massive amounts of fresh water. The current landowner and drilling company claimed that the two groundwater springs they found were interconnected to the Trinity and Edwards aquifers. The client planned on purchasing the water resource and selling the product to the water district. Multiple local firms and individual hydrogeologists in Texas confirmed to the client that the land was good and should be purchased. The client called G3SoilWorks to confirm whether the property was connected to the aquifers and whether it would successfully provide water over an extended period of time without impacting other aquifers.
Previous to the arrival of G3SoilWorks, the drilling company unloaded 10,000 gallons of hydrochloric acid down the well to dissolve the calcium carbonate in the limestone in an attempt to increase the size of the well opening and improve water yield. While that increased the speed at which the water could be pumped, it did not improve the amount of water available from the well. In order to confirm whether water was coming from sustainable ground water, G3SoilWorks applied monitoring devices on the two different wells. The first well quickly dewatered and the ground water never returned. The pump test for the second well showed that the water curve dropped and then rose instead of leveling out.
After confirming with the landowner and drilling company’s hydrogeologist that the ground and surface water did not communicate, Larry Fanning investigated the land surrounding the springs. Within an hour he found a stream that dried out near a sinkhole. They found that groundwater was funneling into a sinkhole, which supplied the spring with water. G3SoilWorks was able to trace the ground water near the sinkhole back to the spring, and further discovered that the water pumped from the spring was supplying this stream, essentially creating a chain.
G3SoilWorks was able to provide evidence to the client against purchasing this land, for a reasonable amount. The client was spared from spending multi-millions on purchasing land that did not provide promised quantities of fresh ground water.
