ckc8008
Geotechnical
- Mar 6, 2005
- 3
Hello. I have had an interesting development on one of our projects and wanted to get an opinion as to what we have.
Some background: this is a construction project in northern Middle Tennessee that involves the installation of numerous geothermal wells.
Well it seems that in one of the wells this week, the driller encountered something "contaminated" according to the contractor. This substance was reportedly encountered at a depth of 300 feet which puts it about 250 into limestone bedrock. It is noted we are in a karst area and the general area is rural farmland.
The contractor took a sample of the substance for us which was delivered to our office. It is like water, light brown in color, and stinks like all get out. To me, it smells like old, stale diesel fuel.
We are going to send in some of the sample to the analytical lab for petroleum and lead testing.
My initial thoughts were this could be either:
a. free product from some distant UST release (likely a farm UST which are not regulated here in TN)
or
b. someone, either trying to stop the project or a disgruntled ex-employee, poured the diesel down the hole sometime prior.
But then, after talking to an older neighbor, I am wondering if this could be a small pocket of crude oil? Tennessee is not known to have a lot of oil or gas production, but they are more common in Kentucky to our north. And, according to my neighbor, there was quite a bit of oil exploration performed in TN back in the 50's and 60's.
So, to anyone who has dealt with this stuff, what do you think? Can you suggest anything or any analytical test to confirm that it is nothing more than crude oil?
I think you can see my situation. If it's truly diesel or gasoline or something, then this project would likely be stopped. If just crude oil, probably not such a big deal and no lost time and money (you know how those contractors are).
Thanks in advance.
Some background: this is a construction project in northern Middle Tennessee that involves the installation of numerous geothermal wells.
Well it seems that in one of the wells this week, the driller encountered something "contaminated" according to the contractor. This substance was reportedly encountered at a depth of 300 feet which puts it about 250 into limestone bedrock. It is noted we are in a karst area and the general area is rural farmland.
The contractor took a sample of the substance for us which was delivered to our office. It is like water, light brown in color, and stinks like all get out. To me, it smells like old, stale diesel fuel.
We are going to send in some of the sample to the analytical lab for petroleum and lead testing.
My initial thoughts were this could be either:
a. free product from some distant UST release (likely a farm UST which are not regulated here in TN)
or
b. someone, either trying to stop the project or a disgruntled ex-employee, poured the diesel down the hole sometime prior.
But then, after talking to an older neighbor, I am wondering if this could be a small pocket of crude oil? Tennessee is not known to have a lot of oil or gas production, but they are more common in Kentucky to our north. And, according to my neighbor, there was quite a bit of oil exploration performed in TN back in the 50's and 60's.
So, to anyone who has dealt with this stuff, what do you think? Can you suggest anything or any analytical test to confirm that it is nothing more than crude oil?
I think you can see my situation. If it's truly diesel or gasoline or something, then this project would likely be stopped. If just crude oil, probably not such a big deal and no lost time and money (you know how those contractors are).
Thanks in advance.
