Post by jonsdigs on Dec 14, 2006 10:58:29 GMT -5
Cave water may supply Chapel Hill
Shelbyville Times Gazette
Thursday, December 14, 2006
By Clint Confehr
Doug Murphy, executive director of the Shelbyville-based Duck River Agency, stands at the mouth of Chapel Hill's cave, a new source of water for the town's purification plant.
(T-G Photo by Clint Confehr)
CHAPEL HILL -- Water from a cave has been found to be just right, thank you, for Jack Daniel's, George Dickel's and Granny Fish's products and now it's to be so for this north Marshall County town.
Testing of a system to draw water from a cave was anticipated late this week by Town Administrator Mike Hatten who recently conducted a tour at what's been known as the Mary Fort Cave on property purchased by the town for about $32,000.
"We had to find an alternate water source," Hatten said. "The town had one; a well, but the state likes towns to have two sources."
Chapel Hill dug another well, but results weren't satisfactory, said Hatten, who doesn't know exactly who came up with the idea of using the cave, but it's developed into a good solution.
"We had people come down from Middle Tennessee State University" to look at the cave, the town administrator said.
Divers were brought in from consulting agency and they found that "The cave water is 45-feet deep," Hatten said.
The South Central Tennessee Development District helped Chapel Hill get a Community Development Block Grant to fund the project and the town was on its way to fulfilling the state's requirement for two sources of water.
That was so until the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation raised a question about a particular species of plant life.
"TDEC was in fear that there might be a four-leaf prairie clover in the area, but it wasn't," Hatten said.
Regardless, there was a delay of about eight months.
Now, the town has a pipe tapping into the cave to draw out raw water that's to be pumped to the municipal water treatment plant.
Early tests indicate that about 150 gallons of water can be pumped from the cave every minute without having to wait for the cave to "recharge," as Hatten puts it.
He displayed the mouth of the cave last week when two representatives of the Duck River Agency visited town. Doug Murphy, the executive director of the DRA, and agency Finance Director Jill Garrett were interested in the cave and water sources in the Duck River Watershed.
The DRA was formed in conjunction with the Normandy and Columbia dams' construction projects by TVA. DRA leaders from Bedford, Marshall, Coffee, Maury and Hickman counties are charged by the state with the responsibility of protecting water quality and quantity in the Duck River watershed.
Hatten says that geologists have said they believe that the town's cave water is from the Duck River, but because nobody can see that far underground, it's not yet been proven to be so.
The DRA is also a development agency and has recently gained control of a $10.5 million fund that was invested through a bank in Columbia. The increased earning power is to grow that trust fund so it will be able to finance a large project to serve all the counties in the watershed.
The agency is associated with various environmental groups and participates in making seminars available that can benefit municipalities.
"Chapel Hill would be interested in whatever workshops you can put on," Hatten told Murphy and Garrett during the tour. "How you take care of Mother Nature says a lot about your community."
Chapel Hill's population is about 1,500. It has approximately 600 water taps and is one of only two municipalities in Marshall County that purifies its own water.
Article
Shelbyville Times Gazette
Thursday, December 14, 2006
By Clint Confehr
Doug Murphy, executive director of the Shelbyville-based Duck River Agency, stands at the mouth of Chapel Hill's cave, a new source of water for the town's purification plant.
(T-G Photo by Clint Confehr)
CHAPEL HILL -- Water from a cave has been found to be just right, thank you, for Jack Daniel's, George Dickel's and Granny Fish's products and now it's to be so for this north Marshall County town.
Testing of a system to draw water from a cave was anticipated late this week by Town Administrator Mike Hatten who recently conducted a tour at what's been known as the Mary Fort Cave on property purchased by the town for about $32,000.
"We had to find an alternate water source," Hatten said. "The town had one; a well, but the state likes towns to have two sources."
Chapel Hill dug another well, but results weren't satisfactory, said Hatten, who doesn't know exactly who came up with the idea of using the cave, but it's developed into a good solution.
"We had people come down from Middle Tennessee State University" to look at the cave, the town administrator said.
Divers were brought in from consulting agency and they found that "The cave water is 45-feet deep," Hatten said.
The South Central Tennessee Development District helped Chapel Hill get a Community Development Block Grant to fund the project and the town was on its way to fulfilling the state's requirement for two sources of water.
That was so until the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation raised a question about a particular species of plant life.
"TDEC was in fear that there might be a four-leaf prairie clover in the area, but it wasn't," Hatten said.
Regardless, there was a delay of about eight months.
Now, the town has a pipe tapping into the cave to draw out raw water that's to be pumped to the municipal water treatment plant.
Early tests indicate that about 150 gallons of water can be pumped from the cave every minute without having to wait for the cave to "recharge," as Hatten puts it.
He displayed the mouth of the cave last week when two representatives of the Duck River Agency visited town. Doug Murphy, the executive director of the DRA, and agency Finance Director Jill Garrett were interested in the cave and water sources in the Duck River Watershed.
The DRA was formed in conjunction with the Normandy and Columbia dams' construction projects by TVA. DRA leaders from Bedford, Marshall, Coffee, Maury and Hickman counties are charged by the state with the responsibility of protecting water quality and quantity in the Duck River watershed.
Hatten says that geologists have said they believe that the town's cave water is from the Duck River, but because nobody can see that far underground, it's not yet been proven to be so.
The DRA is also a development agency and has recently gained control of a $10.5 million fund that was invested through a bank in Columbia. The increased earning power is to grow that trust fund so it will be able to finance a large project to serve all the counties in the watershed.
The agency is associated with various environmental groups and participates in making seminars available that can benefit municipalities.
"Chapel Hill would be interested in whatever workshops you can put on," Hatten told Murphy and Garrett during the tour. "How you take care of Mother Nature says a lot about your community."
Chapel Hill's population is about 1,500. It has approximately 600 water taps and is one of only two municipalities in Marshall County that purifies its own water.
Article