Carey has a wellfield developed in Silurian dolomite, but affected by nearby very large quarries and shallow upper Silurian to Devonian karstic “ridge” carbonates vulnerable to surface effects. Work included development of a wellhead protection area delineation based on collecting local geological and hydrologic information and hydrogeologic analysis, and an associated management plan rather than having the OEPA do it for “free”. Information was integrated with CAD and electronic topo maps from several sources in our GIS system with SURFER, and modeling conducted using a MODFLOW-MODPATH package integrated with ArcView and SURFER.

Nonpoint-source water quality mitigation planning is in progress to keep nitrates below government MCLs without water treatment.