1 Introduction
Approximately 45 percent of the world’s population live in rural areas (United Nations, 2019), and in these rural areas, household water is commonly provided by domestic water wells. Domestic wells are defined herein as privately owned water wells supplying a household’s domestic water, including the water used for drinking, cooking, flushing and bathing. These wells are also sometimes referred to as private wells or residential wells.
In Canada and the United States, it is estimated that more than one tenth of its population relies on domestic wells for household water supply, while globally, about half of the world’s population relies on groundwater for drinking water (Margat and van der Gun, 2013). Unfortunately, we do not have sound global estimates of the population supplied by domestic wells, but it is likely that hundreds of millions of people rely on domestic wells for their household water supply.
Collection of information about the construction of domestic water wells is widely considered an important component of groundwater and drinking water management programs. Well construction records are usually compiled in a database that is made available to various users of the information who use the records for a wide range of purposes. For example, well records are used by homebuyers to confirm an adequate water supply, government regulators to ensure proper well construction for safe drinking water and groundwater protection, groundwater managers to estimate groundwater utilization, public health officials to investigate potential exposure to groundwater contaminants, and researchers to better understand aquifer characteristics.
Well record databases are arguably the largest and most important archive of information on groundwater and geological conditions worldwide, and in many jurisdictions, they are the only groundwater data collected and published by government organizations. These databases may be more than 50 years old, while in other cases the databases were only recently developed (Perrone and Jasechko, 2017; Perrone and Jasechko, 2019; Nova Scotia Environment, 2020; Government of Yukon, 2021).
This book provides an overview of well record databases, including the history, availability, uses and shortcomings of these databases, as well as a few examples of how they are used to support groundwater research. This book is part of a series of books that focus on domestic wells, and therefore the emphasis of this book is on domestic well data. Well record databases, however, can include wells drilled for public water supply (community or municipal supply) or other uses such as groundwater exploration (test wells), agricultural, industrial, commercial, monitoring, dewatering or geothermal uses. Well record databases are also used to record details about well decommissioning or well alteration activities (e.g., well deepening, rehabilitation, or redevelopment). Although the emphasis of this book is on domestic well record data, much of the discussion contained in the book will also be applicable to these other types of well record data. The intended audience of this book includes students, educators, researchers, groundwater professionals, groundwater managers and policy makers with a background in water science and a professional interest in water well record databases. The book focuses on North America, although some information from other countries is presented.