Castalla starts the construction of a water well in a new aquifer to supply the city

• The project will help reverse the water deficit in the capital of La Foia and is funded by the Diputación de Alicante with 115,000 euros

Castalla Town Hall has started the construction of a water well in an aquifer to supply the city. The project, with an overall budget of 115,000 euros, is funded by the Diputación de Alicante, and will allow the Council to reverse the water deficit suffered by the town and help solve the current supply problems. The equipment will rise in the mountains known as ‘Tella’, where the council had catalogued the large source, which the provincial entity has named ‘La Conejera’ or ‘El Conejo’.

Initially, the plans of the Provincial Council envisaged finding water at a depth of 400 metres and estimated that the spring would have a capacity of 250,000 cubic metres per year. From the Town Hall they have assured that this volume of water coincides, more or less, with the water deficit in Castellón. However, when the work of the drilling company reached a depth of 80 metres, a large amount of water began to flow, which is why the technicians estimate that the capacity of the aquifer may be even greater. The Mayor of Castalla, Antonio Bernabeu, has described the discovery as “very important news, very positive for the town, which will help us to reverse the current water deficit and prevent the exhaustion of the rest of the springs in our surroundings”.

Also, the council technicians have assessed that it is a water of great chemical quality and purity, after the first measurements. For his part, the first mayor has welcomed the news, but prefers to be cautious and “wait for the analysis of the company responsible to reveal the exact quality of the fluid that flows from the aquifer.

At this point, the next steps in the project, once the excavation work is completed, which is estimated to take approximately three months, are to seal the well and build a reservoir to store the water that flows from the aquifer. With regard to this container, the mayor stated that “the deposit will be located on a plot of land close to the ‘Tella’ mountain aquifer, so that we can transport the fluid to the drinking water distribution network with minimum energy consumption, thanks to the force of gravity itself”.

In the area where the water well is being prospected, a considerable amount of foam can be seen, while the drilling work is taking place. According to municipal sources, this is due to the use of biodegradable foaming agent by the company responsible, which helps to remove the waste produced during the drilling work and is not at all harmful in the areas where the dumping ends.

Currently, the municipality of Castalla is supplied with water from two sources: the ‘Voltes II’ well, built in 2001, which draws from the ‘Voltes’ aquifer; and the ‘Cantarina’ well, from 2007, which draws its water from the ‘Maigmó’ aquifer. The Voltes aquifer is in water balance, while the Maigmó aquifer is slightly over-exploited. With the incorporation of the new well ‘El Conejo’, it will be possible to extract the flow equivalent to the over-exploitation of the ‘Maigmó’ aquifer in order to balance it.