Louisiana Administrative Code › Title 56 - PUBLIC WORKS › Part I - Water Wells › Chapter 1 - Registering Water Wells › Section I-113 - Definitions

Current through Register Vol. 50, No. 6, June 20, 2024
A. Glossary of
				Terms. Letter in parentheses is the number of the reference found in
				§115 which is the source of the definition.
Abandoned Well
- a well is considered to be
				  abandoned if:
a. its use has been permanently discontinued;
b. its pumping equipment has been permanently removed;
c. the well is in such a state of disrepair that it cannot be
				  used to supply water, and/or has the potential for transmitting surface
				  contaminants into the aquifer;
d. the well poses potential health or safety hazards;
				  or
e. the well is in such a condition that cannot be placed in
				  the active, standby or inactive status.
Active Well
- a well is considered to be
				  active if it is an operating well used to supply water.
Annular Space
- the space between the drill
				  hole and the well casing.
Aquifer
- a formation, group of formations,
				  or a part of a formation that contains sufficient saturated material to yield
				  significant quantities of water to wells. (E)
Aquifer Test
- aquifer or pumping tests are
				  made in water wells to obtain information about the performance and efficiency
				  of the well being pumped, and/or to obtain data from which the hydraulic
				  characteristics of the aquifer can be calculated. The test made to determine
				  hydraulic characteristics of an aquifer is usually referred to as
aquifer test
.
Artesian (Confined Ground Water)
- when the
				  water level rises above the top of the aquifer which the well taps, the aquifer
				  is assumed to be
artesian
. An artesian well flows only when
				  the water level is above land surface. (E)
Assistant Secretary
- the Assistant Secretary
				  of the Office of Conservation, Department of Natural Resources, or his
				  designee.
Bacteriological Analysis
- this analysis,
				  usually for drinking water, consists of a laboratory report indicating the
				  presence or absence of coliform bacteria in a given water sample, as determined
				  by laboratory procedure.
Bentonite Slurry
- a mixture of bentonite and
				  water, weighing not less than 9 pounds per gallon.
Casing
- a tubular retaining structure,
				  generally metal or PVC which is installed in a drilled, bored, driven, or
				  augured hole to maintain the well opening.
Cement-Bentonite Slurry
- a mixture of
				  cement, bentonite and water, consisting of not more than 8 percent bentonite by
				  dry weight of cement and a maximum of 10 gallons of water per sack (94 pounds)
				  of cement. Additives, in the approved and proper ratio, may be added to the
				  slurry if required.
Chemical Analysis
- a chemical analysis is
				  usually a report of dissolved minerals in the water and the water's physical
				  properties, such as temperature and color. The minimum chemical properties that
				  are usually determined are hardness, specific conductance, hydrogen-ion
				  concentration (pH), dissolved solids, chloride, bicarbonate, iron, fluoride and
				  nitrate.
Coarse Ground Bentonite
- a processed
				  bentonite used to seal well casings and to plug holes. Coarse ground bentonite
				  is placed by pouring from surface or pumping from the bottom to surface. An
				  approved inorganic polymer may be used to retard swelling of the
				  bentonite.
Community Public Supply Water Well
- a public
				  supply well which serves at least 15 service connections used by year-round
				  residents or regularly serves at least 25 year-round residents. A community
				  public supply well may be owned by a municipality or community, a water
				  district, a corporation, a private individual or by a local, state or federal
				  governmental agency.
Contaminant
- any undesirable physical,
				  chemical, biological, or radiological substance or matter in water. (F)
Contamination
- any introduction into water
				  of microorganisms, chemicals, wastes, or waste-water in a concentration that
				  makes the water unfit for its intended use. (D)
Contractor
- the word
contractor
in these regulations is used to refer to any
				  person, firm or corporation who is licensed to engage in the business of
				  drilling, reworking or installing water wells, monitoring wells, heat pump
				  wells or holes, geotechnical boreholes, and/or plugging and abandoning wells or
				  holes, excluding oil and gas wells.
Department
- the Louisiana Department of
				  Natural Resources, Office of Conservation.
Dewatering Well
- a water well installed to
				  dewater an aquifer or lower a water table in order to allow construction or
				  mining activities.
Disinfection
- the killing of a large
				  proportion of microorganisms in or on a substance with the probability that all
				  pathogenic microorganisms will be killed.
Ditch
- a man-made excavation dug to convey
				  surface water for drainage purposes or irrigation.
Director or a Board
- see
Assistant
				  Secretary
.
Domestic Well
- a water well used exclusively
				  to supply the household needs of the owner/lessee and his family. Uses may
				  include drinking, cooking, washing, sanitary purposes, lawn and garden watering
				  and caring for pets.
Drawdown
- the difference, usually in feet,
				  between the static (nonpumping) water level and the pumping level in a well
				  after the well has been pumped for a specified period of time.
Drill Cuttings
- samples of the material
				  obtained during drillings and are the source of lithologic information needed
				  for proper selection of screen openings. A principal objective of drilling test
				  holes is to obtain samples. (A)
Driller
- see
Contractor
.
Drilling
- the word
drilling
in these regulations is used to refer to the drilling, boring, coring, driving
				  or augering of a well or hole.
Drilling Contractor
- see
Contractor
.
Driller's Log
-a driller's log is the
				  driller's description of the geologic strata encountered, their thickness and
				  depth. (A)
Drilling Mud
-a fluid composed of water and
				  clay (either native clay or a combination of native and commercial clays) used
				  in drilling operations to remove cuttings from the hole, to clean and cool the
				  bit, to reduce friction between the drill stem and the sides of the hole, to
				  seal the sides of the hole, to prevent caving, bridging or loss of circulation,
				  and to prevent the interchange of water between aquifers. When permitted,
				  drilling mud may be used as filler or plugging material, provided it weighs not
				  less than 9 pounds per gallon.
Electrical Log
-a record of the resistivity
				  of the subsurface formations and the contained fluid and spontaneous potentials
				  generated in the borehole, both plotted in terms of depth below some datum,
				  such as land surface. Similar logs commonly made in boreholes are the induction
				  logs. Other borehole geophysical logs that also may be available are the gamma
				  ray, caliper and neutron logs.
Flood Prone Area
-an area subject to a
				  100-year flood level as established by the administering agency for the Federal
				  Flood Insurance Program.
Free Flowing Water Well
-an artesian well
				  which flows, under natural conditions, at or above the ground surface.
Geopressured Aquifer
-a term used for an
				  aquifer, especially in the Gulf Coast Area, in which the fluid pressure exceeds
				  the normal hydrostatic pressure of 0.465 pounds per square inch per foot of
				  depth. (B)
Geotechnical Borehole
- an exploratory
				  borehole drilled, augured, bored or cored to obtain soil samples to be analyzed
				  for chemical and/or physical properties.
Geothermal
- pertaining to the internal heat
				  of the earth.
Gravel-Packed Well
- a well in which properly
				  graded gravel or coarse sand is hydraulically placed in the area immediately
				  surrounding the screen or slotted pipe used as a screen to increase the
				  effective diameter of the well, to stabilize the aquifer and to prevent sand
				  from entering the well.
Ground Water
- water percolating below the
				  earth's surface.
Health Hazard
- any condition that may create
				  a danger to public health and well being.
Heat Pump Hole
- a hole drilled to install
				  piping for an earth-coupled water source heat pump system, also known as a
				  vertical closed-loop system.
Heat Pump Supply Well
- a water well which
				  supplies ground water to a heat pump heat exchanger.
Industrial Well
- a well used to supply water
				  for plants that manufacture, process or fabricate a product. The water may or
				  may not be incorporated into the product being manufactured. The water is
				  usually used to cool machinery, to provide sanitary facilities for employees,
				  to air condition the plant, and water grounds at the plant. Water used for
				  mining or processing ore, such as gravel, is included in the industrial
				  category.
Inactive Well
- a well is considered to be
				  inactive if it is not presently operating but is maintained in such a way that
				  it can be put back in operation with a minimum of effort to supply
				  water.
Irrigation/Agricultural Well
- a well used
				  for irrigating cultivated plants, for watering stock, for crawfish and catfish
				  farming, and for similar agricultural activities. Most irrigation wells supply
				  water for farm crops, but this category also includes wells that are used for
				  watering parks, golf courses, cemeteries and wells which are used exclusively
				  for watering lawns in urban areas.
Lessee
- see
Owner
.
Monitoring Well
- a well used to obtain
				  hydrologic and water quality data, usually installed at or near a known or
				  potential source of ground water contamination.
Neat Cement
- a mixture of cement and water,
				  consisting of not more than 5 gallons of water per sack (94 pounds) of
				  cement.
Noncommunity Public Supply Well
- a public
				  supply water well which serves either fewer than 15 service connections or
				  fewer than 25 year-round residents or no year-round residents. Examples of the
				  former case are small public water supplies for mobile home parks,
				  subdivisions, etc. which fall below the 15 connections/25 persons criteria for
				  community water supplies. The latter case includes public water supplies which
				  serve no year-round residents, such as bars and lounges, motels, camps, office
				  buildings, restaurants, rest stops, service stations, recreational facilities,
				  schools, commercial establishments, etc.
Observation Well
- a well used by the owner,
				  by governmental agencies, or by an appropriate engineering or research
				  organization to obtain information on the water resources of an area.
Owner
- individual, corporation, association,
				  partnership, institution or governmental agency who is either the legal owner
				  of the property on which the well or hole is located or is holding a long-term
				  lease on the property.
Permeability
- a measure of the relative ease
				  with which porous media can transmit a liquid under a potential gradient. Sands
				  have a higher permeability than clays.
Pilot Hole
- a hole drilled with the intent
				  to install casing and to produce water. It is usually of a smaller diameter
				  than the proposed well and has to be reamed to a larger diameter for the
				  installation of casing and screen.
Plumbness
- the variation with depth of the
				  center line of the well from a vertical line drawn through the center of the
				  well at the top of the casing. (C)
Pollution
- a condition created by harmful or
				  objectionable material in water. (D)
Potable Water
- water whose bacteriological,
				  physical and chemical properties make it suitable for human consumption.
Power Generation Well
- a well used to supply
				  water for generation of any type of power.
Private Well
- see
Domestic
				  Well
.
Public Supply Water Well
- a well which
				  provides water for drinking, cooking or washing use by the public, or
				  transients, or by persons other than the immediate family of the owner of the
				  supply. A public supply water well may be either a community water well or a
				  noncommunity water well.
Pump-Down Method
- a positive displacement
				  method for placing grout or slurry material by pumping or forced injection by
				  air pressure.
Pumping Test
- see
Aquifer
				  Test
.
Pumping Water Level
- the water level in a
				  well which is being pumped, usually expressed in feet above or below a specific
				  datum, such as land surface.
PVC Well Casing
- a polyvinyl chloride
				  plastic pipe conforming to current AWWA Standard A-100 and/or ASTM F-480
				  Standard for water well casing.
Registered Permit Plat
- a land surveyor's
				  plat showing section, township, range, and the distances from the section lines
				  to the location of the well (oil, gas, injection, etc). The permit plat is
				  submitted to the Office of Conservation with the oil or gas well permit
				  application.
Registered Well
- an inventoried well that
				  has been assigned an identification number by the department and whose records
				  are available.
Relief Well
-any well drilled for the sole
				  purpose of relieving the hydrostatic pressure inside a levee system during
				  times of high water.
Reworking Water Well
- rehabilitation or
				  modification of a water well to increase its efficiency, restore its capacity,
				  and/or improve its water quality. Methods of reworking water wells include
				  removing and replacing the screen, regravel packing the screen, placing a new
				  screen within the old screen, placing a liner pipe within the old casing or
				  redeveloping a well by surging, adicizing, jetting, etc.
Rig-Supply Well
- a water well drilled at an
				  oil or gas drilling site to supply water for drilling and/or other oil field
				  related activities.
Saline Water
- water with a dissolved solids
				  content of 1,000 milligrams per liter (parts per million) or more.
Sanitary Seal
- a suitable threaded, flanged,
				  or welded water-tight cap or compression seal installed at the top of the
				  wellcasing so as to prevent the entrance of contaminated water or other
				  objectionable material into the well.
Sanitary Sewer
- an underground conduit that
				  conveys domestic, commercial or industrial sewage.
Screen
- a structural tubular retainer,
				  usually metal or PVC, used to support the hole in unconsolidated material with
				  openings which are selected on the basis of adopted standards, and which allows
				  sand free water to flow freely into the well in ample quantities and with a
				  minimum loss of head. In agricultural wells, slotted pipe is sometimes used as
				  a screen.
Seepage
- the slow movement of water and/or
				  other fluids through the soil into the subsurface.
Septic Tank
- an underground water-tight tank
				  which receives sewage.
Specific Capacity
- the rate of discharge of
				  water from a well divided by the drawdown of water level within the well for a
				  specified period of continuous pumping of the well. It is usually expressed as
				  "gallons per minute per foot of drawdown after (specified) hours of continuous
				  pumping."
Standby Well
- a well is considered to be a
				  standby if it is used in emergencies or occasionally used to supply
				  water.
Static Water Level
- static water level is
				  the nonpumping water level in a well that has not been in operation for a
				  period of time and is usually expressed in feet above or below a specified
				  datum, such as land surface.
Stream
- a natural channel or water course
				  which conveys surface and subsurface runoff.
Storm Sewer
- an underground conduit used for
				  covering surface water.
Subsidence
- a local mass movement that
				  involves principally the downward settling or sinking of the earth's surface
				  with little or no horizontal motion. (B)
Subsurface Absorption Fields
- an underground
				  area containing a bedding of aggregate with distribution lines to permit
				  disposal of septic tank effluent.
Test Hole
- a temporary exploratory borehole
				  drilled for the sole purpose of obtaining geologic, hydrologic and water
				  quality data.
Test Well
- see
Test
				  Hole
.
Underground Injection
- the subsurface
				  implacement of fluids by well injection. (F)
Underground Water
- see
Ground
				  Water
.
Uniformity Coefficient
- the uniformity
				  coefficient is the number expressing the ratio of the 40 percent size of the
				  material to its 90 percent size. Size refers to the percentage by weight
				  retained on a given sieve.
Vent (Breather Pipe)
- a screened outlet at
				  the upper end of the well casing to allow equalization of air pressure in the
				  well and the escape of gases.
Water Well Contractor
- see
Contractor
.
Well Cap
- a removable, usually water-tight
				  device used to cover an opening into the well casing and is threaded, bolted or
				  otherwise attached to the casing to prevent easy entry by other than the owner
				  and to prevent the entrance of any contaminant or other objectionable material
				  into the well.
AUTHORITY NOTE:
				  Promulgated in accordance with
				  R.S.
				  38:3098-38:3098.8.