Boreholes are necessary in areas where a steady supply of clean water is unavailable. A Borehole is drilled for many uses including industrial, irrigation and domestic consumption.
Although borehole drilling is seen by some as complex and expensive, players in this sector paint a different picture. The entire process including surveys, actual drilling and installation of pump may cost anything from Ksh 1.8 m to 3 million. Factors affecting cost include physical distance from where the drilling company is located, their pricing policies, geological characteristics of the site, extent of the hole and pump used. There are also several licensing requirements that cost money.
Drilling boreholes is a science that must follow strict rules to ensure they are beneficial to all dynamics including the environment. People are looking for the cheapest and quickest way to have boreholes and this is threating to deplete the resources. Before drilling a borehole, both a hydro-geological survey and an Environmental Impact Assessment test have to be carried out and the results submitted to the relevant authorities.
The hydro-geological survey is meant to determine availability of water below the ground and the depth at which water is likely to be struck. A test pumping exercise is carried out after the drilling to determine the amount of water the borehole will yield. All this data should be submitted to the Water Resource Management Authority (WRMA) which is the supervising authority.
WRMA has the mandate to develop policies that govern the conservation of groundwater by balancing sustainable use and national development. The authority issues permits required for abstraction of water from all machine drilled boreholes, that excludes hand dug shallow wells. The National Environment Management Authority (NEMA) on the other hand gives the nod after the submission of data from an Environmental Impact Assessment test.
Failure to carry out a thorough due diligence can cause a number of problems to the aquifer the borehole will tap from. Due diligence involves making sure that the material used to construct the borehole will not for example contaminate the surrounding area. It is important to involve hydrogeologists who design and carry out tests that make sure the borehole performs as expected.
Some of the issues that may arise from lack of due diligence before drilling a borehole include depletion of the aquifer especially if the replenishing of the aquifer was not put into consideration and having a dry or low yielding borehole among others.
As Sparr Drilling Company we also acknowledges these challenges and adds that in some cases one may encounter dishonest clients who wishes his/her drilling works be done without proper documentation.
In summary, let us use the proper procedure to drill a borehole that will have long lasting effect to the generation to come.
