Archive 2008 - 2019

Holliston's Water System Explained (part one)

by Jeff Weise
2/19/2010

QUANTITY:  For the past two years the Town has exceeded the limit the DEP has set for the withdrawal of groundwater by the town. During calendar year 2009, the Water Department withdrew a total of 452 million gallons of groundwater (11 MG less than the previous year). This resulted in an annual daily average of 1.24 million gallons per day which exceeded the DEP allocated withdrawal to Holliston of 1.14 million gallons per day by 100,000 gallons per day.

QUALITY:  The Town now has a total of six established wells and one potential future well.  Of these, five have problems:

-Well #1 has high manganese levels and no treatment plant so the water is sequestered to bind the manganese and prevent dissolution

-Well #2 recently has been declared “Ground Water under the  Influence of Surface Water” by the DEP requiring costly remedial action within the next eighteen months.

-Well #3 is no longer usable due to high iron levels and DEP     regulations.

-Well #4 has been inactive for over a year due to high iron levels.

-Well #6 is being run through its treatment plant at less than optimal output due to rising levels of manganese and color.
   
DEP WITHDRAWAL RATE

Because Holliston’s groundwater comes from the Charles River Watershed Basin, the DEP has set a limit on how much water we can withdrawal from the existing wells. We can appeal to the DEP for a higher withdrawal limit if we can prove that we are pursuing significant conservation efforts, and account for at least 90 % of our output – including what is consumed by, backwashing filters, fire fighting, street sweeping, hydrant flushing, play field irrigation and other non-metered uses. We are presently billing for about 80%.  We know there is no major leak. We are working on further quantifying the remaining use.

The only sure way to change the limit is to site another well. The new source approval process through the DEP is generally projected to require from five to seven years and costs four to seven million dollars.

To ignore the DEP’s limit could result in violations and risks significant  fines of up to $25,000 per day. Without resolution of the short-term quantity and quality problems, the water department could be forced to implement mandatory water bans, and could result in DEP also issuing Emergency Water Use Restriction for Holliston.

Part two of the report will include a detailed explaination of each of the seven wells in town.