Mains water connection, well not fit

DrPhilG

Looking for some advice on options.

Bought my house 12 years ago, was told that it's on a bore well.

What they didn't tell me was that the well water is so bad that filtration can't even start to cope. Acceptable level of iron is 200 units in a sample, my last untreated sample came in at nearly 80,000 and even after treatment it's nearly 900.

Have spoken to all the neighbours, approximately 50 houses in the same boat. Rural Donegal.

We went for the rural water connection grant but we're rejected on the basis that the per unit cost was too high, largely because we're on a hilltop.

Are there any other options of suggestions? I've spent in the region of €15k in 12 years on replacing filtration systems that break down due to the severity of the water contamination. Iron, manganese, even arsenic levels are way high. Can't drink the water and it's murdering appliances etc too.

10-10-20

Hi DrPhillG, At the risk of sounding naive - is this not a problem for Irish Water/Uisce to remedy as a group improvement scheme? Was IW approached and if so what did they say?

And what's the bore-hold depth? Is a deeper bore likely to result in a better quality supply?

the_amazing_raisin

Would rainwater harvesting be a potential solution? It'll obviously still need treatment to be drinkable but is probably easier than the well water and might be easier on the appliances without treatment

I've seen systems from Graf that can use rainwater and will use mains water if the tanks are too empty

Perhaps a similar system could be used for the well so that you only use the poor quality water if absolutely necessary

DrPhilG

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123677078#Comment_123677078

As I understand it, IW will charge full whack for the job so the only way for it to be practical and possible is if the rural water grant scheme covers most of the cost.

The cost for our proposed connection was calculated at near €30k per property and I think the grant only covers about €12k each which would leave close to €20 per household which would obviously kill the application. Personally I'd beg, borrow or steal €20k to make it happen but that kind of money is simply not realistic for most. Especially with a number of these householders suffering major financial pressure because of Mica.

Thats presumably why the grant process won't consider any applications where the cost per unit exceeds €15k.

DrPhilG

My bore well is 100m deep, some neighbours are similar, or a bit more/less.

madmac187

Concrete tank mate attached to rainwater harvesting from house best and cheapest bet. 30,000 gallon tank. Best bet by far, I bought 3 for work €5k each. €2k to dig and probably €1k to pipe it subject to size and paperwork of house. Uv filter and sediment filter with an over flow. I did hear ye get a fair bit of rain in Donegal lol. Drinking water would be an issue however I think with filtration it should be drinkable. In saying that drinking it shouldn’t be an issue if rainwater just uv filter for the storage of it.

the_amazing_raisin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123737329#Comment_123737329

You'd wonder how much stuff we use drinking water for is actually required

Really you should be able to get away with using it for drinking, cooking and brushing teeth

Supposedly you shouldn't shower in rainwater but I imagine a filter plus UV steriliser should stop most of the bad stuff and the rest can be avoided by not drinking your bathwater 😂

Out of curiosity, have you had your tank water tested in a lab to see what quality standard it is after the filter/steriliser?

madmac187

Water quality tanks haven’t been tested as they are only for firefighting storage only so no need, however I do have above ground storage for potable water and have had that tested and it’s aok. Now this is potable water stored, approx every 6 weeks filled and no issue. It goes through a uv filter stored in a kingspan plastic tank approx 16000 litre storage. We are a site off grid in terms of water and power in the sticks.

Bawnmore

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123738535#Comment_123738535

Might be a stupid question - but how is it filled every 6 weeks? Some crowd in to fill it?

madmac187

Yeah I get company to deliver water every 6 weeks. Costs about 480 + vat, so it’s not cheap tbh. If you were doing something like that yourself just invest in a trailer, fill it in someone’s house that has mains and buy a 2 inch water pump. Want to be clean if drinking, we uv filter it to drink as a precaution and I test every now and then tbh

the_amazing_raisin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123738535#Comment_123738535

Thanks for the info, have you ever considered making the harvested rainwater drinkable?

It'd be interesting to see what you'd need to do to bring it to a potable state

I was doing some searching a while ago and there's no set method but the general consensus is that you'd want a few filtering stages and a UV steriliser

I guess it depends on what your starting point is, if you've a lot of birds sh!tting on your roof for example then that's going to need more work to filter out