Abandoned wells pose dangers to people, water

SPRINGFIELD, Ill. -- Tens of thousands of abandoned wells dot the Illinois landscape. Some lie in urban subdivisions, topped by rickety covers. Some are open holes in empty farm fields.

All are potential health threats.

People, especially children, can fall into the larger wells. Animals can get into the smaller ones, dying there and contaminating the water. Sewage or farm chemicals can leach into wells and reach the aquifers that supply water for miles around.

"It's a direct pipeline down to our water supply," said Bruce Stikkers, a resource conservationist with the Champaign County Soil and Water Conservation District. "Once you mess up your underground water supply it's not easy to clean up."

The dangers are not just theoretical.

A 10-year-old Buffalo Grove girl died in 1991 after falling into an abandoned well. And the state health department said there is no doubt the wells are letting pollution reach some water supplies.

The Illinois Agriculture Department has launched a small program to help landowners pay to have old wells sealed properly. The agency hopes the program will show the need for a larger effort and more state money.

Susceptible to pollution

Experts say there is no way of knowing how many of the state's wells have been abandoned, but the figure could be as high as 100,000.

Clint Mudgett, head of the Illinois Public Health Department's division of environmental health, estimates the state has 400,000 private wells, with thousands more being added every year.

"I think it's safe to say tens of thousands are abandoned," he said. "There are a lot of old brick-lined wells in Illinois that are just notoriously susceptible to run-off and groundwater contamination. ... I have no doubt that it's happening."

Some of the wells are sealed properly -- a process that involves disinfecting the water and filling the shaft with proper material, usually clay. Mudgett said 3,116 wells were sealed in Illinois last year.

But that leaves thousands that are simply being ignored.

Many lie on farmland and once were used to supply water to people and livestock. As families move away, old houses are often torn down and their wells forgotten.

That was the case with land owned by Libby Marr of Springfield.

She inherited a piece of the farm that had been in her family for generations. The home and barns on the land had long since been torn down, but a brick-lined well was still there, its opening covered only by old boards.

Marr said she never gave the well any thought until reading about the potential hazards in a newsletter from the water conservation district. So last year, she let officials seal the well as a demonstration to area farmers.

"It's just one less thing to worry about. It's something that doesn't nag at you anymore," she said.

But abandoned wells are not simply a rural problem.

It's not unusual for wells to be abandoned in housing subdivisions when the homes are added to a municipal water supply, experts said. Often the old wells are sealed properly, but other times they are not. Or people intend to keep using the old wells -- to water the lawn, for instance -- but they gradually are ignored and forgotten.

State sealing program

The state Agriculture Department has started a program that pays up to 80 percent of the landowner's cost of sealing a well, with a maximum grant of $500.

But little money is available for the program, said Mark Werth, an Agriculture Department land and water resource specialist. Werth said they hope enough people will show interest to merit expanding the program.

"We have a serious potential threat," said Allen Wehrmann, a hydrologist for the Illinois State Water Survey. "It's not something to take lightly."