WATER SYSTEM HAS BEEN REPAIRED AND IS NOW WORKING AS DESIGNED

Below is a water system report submitted to us which was prepared by Ralf Henrich.

A Big Thanks To Ralf, who, with his leadership and common sense knowledge to solutions, prevented the community from haphazardly spending around $30,000.00 on a program few wanted and which would have been a further waste of our money. Sadly a few individuals (5  or 6 owners) who still spout to be leaders in VE, and who wrongly accused Ralf, lied about him etc., need to just step aside once and for all and stop embarrassing themselves. Go away! Nobody is listening to you.

Thanks again Ralf and sorry for the few who lied about you for their own selfish reasons. 

Many, many owners in VE really care and thank you!  Truth always prevails!  

Water system report for VE homeowners served by the “Noria” spring box water system.

Prepared by: Ralf Henrich

 2/10/2015

HISTORY

The “Noria” spring box water system, which primarily serves the Estate and Vista Baru section of Valle Escondido, has been plagued by water outages and low pressure issues for over 5 years. Alternative to the analysis of many “water engineering experts”, who have all claimed that the system suffers from a MASSIVE LEAK, no one undertook a protocol to analyze or confirm this diagnosis and/or implement a system to find and repair any leaks responsible for the low water pressure issues.

DIAGNOSIS 

Simple calculations further demonstrated that the water system suffered from a MASSIVE LEAK.

The “Noria” water system serves a total of 69 lots in VE including ones that have no homes constructed on them. If we apply an excessive water usage of 100 gallons per day per person, this is a very high amount based upon US standards and included irrigation, and assume four persons per home, we get a total daily usage of 27,600 gallons per day. (100x4x69= 27,600). The actual needs are much lower since there are vacant lots, many unoccupied homes, and many homes with only two full time residents, but for analysis purposes this number works perfectly. The “Noria” currently takes in 48,000 gallons of fresh spring water in a day during the dry season and significantly more during the rainy season. Simple math demonstrates that the water supply easily exceeds the  usage needs  of the community served by this system by over 20,0000 gallons per day (48,000 – 27,600). The “Noria” spring box holding tank consists of two side by side concrete holding chambers with a combined holding  capacity of 34,000 gallons (17,000/side).

These calculations demonstrated that under no circumstances should the holding tanks have ever run dry yet these tanks were emptying in a few short hours. (A MASSIVE LEAK)

Further water lever testing of the holding tanks demonstrated a loss of over ½” of water every five minutes when all valves to all home were turned off. This loss was calculated to be over 25,000 gallons a day. (A MASSIVE LEAK).

 EVALUATION 

To find the location of this MASSIVE LEAK of the water system individual main shut off valves were systematically closed until we were able to isolate the water loss between two different mains. The testing and valve isolation demonstrated that the MASSIVE LEAK of over 25,000 Gallons a day was between the main in the Estate section next to home 99 and the main supplying the Vista Baru section directly across the street from house # 70. This MASSIVE LEAK was in a main line section with no homes served in between. Utilizing a system of acoustic listening devices and the installation of an additional two main shut off valves on this long main supply line we were able to isolate the leak to be within a 40 meter section directly behind the 8^th hole of the golf course.

SOLUTION

Two sections of the existing main line, where the MASSIVE LEAK was isolated to be within, were excavated and a new bypass line of schedule 40 PVC was professionally installed eliminating the MASSIVE LEAK in the system. Immediately after the repair, and the reopening of the closed mains, the system pressurized, and the water issues plaguing the community were resolved. Ample water pressure was available to all homes even the highest point of the system, a first during the day in many months. This was without the “Noria” spring box even having a chance to recover and fill to capacity. At this point the system is repaired and functional providing able water pressure to all home as the system was designed. The spring box should stay full at all times as we have an excessive supply of at least over 20,000 gallons per day even using extreme usage estimates as demonstrated above. Also we no have two more main shut off valves that can be utilized for locating any future leaks.

COMMENTS

Further inspection of the water system demonstrated that it was built to US standards using schedule 40 PVC throughout the system. The repairs utilized rubber gasket sleeve joints as well as gluing of the PVC joints using proper procedures. While some back-filled areas did contain rocks around the water lines this did not seem to contribute to  the cause of the MASSIVE LEAK. 

Residents need to understand that at one point this “NORIA” spring box system supplied water to all the homes in Valle Escondido as well as the resort. Appropriate forward thinking actions by the developer removing a large section of homes, as well as the resort, from this system by connecting them to the “Municipal” water line, left the VE homeowners served by the “Noria” spring box with a reliable over capacity gravity fed system that should fulfill the water needs of VE residents for many years to come. As with any water system in the world, especially ones in “seismic zones”, water leaks can develop and a method of isolating and repairing them must be budgeted for. I suggest a reserve amount of $10,000 should be budgeted for water system maintenance needs.

Sadly we did encounter sabotage to our tests including street valves being open and closed, water being purposely diverted out of the spring boxes, and bypass valves being closed in the middle of the night. It is unfortunate that we have individuals in the community who seem intent on doing anything they can to prevent progress and community harmony. Also a certain homeowner refused access to their water line system in an attempt to disrupt the test. Fortunately we were able to close a main valve prior to this home and continue to leak test.

CONCLUSION

The history of this situation with the water system goes back many years, beginning with Eric Lindboe's consulting activity (a water engineer with significant US municipal water system experience and responsibility).  He concluded that there was a massive leak in the system and that the solution was to simply find and repair it.  He was hired to perform the study, but only to diagnose the problem, not to fix it.  More recently, non-engineer, “know it all”, volunteers advising the previous SC also concluded that there was a massive leak, but suggested a very expensive, equipment-intensive and electrical powered solution (~$30,000 up front, plus ongoing operating expenses) of pumping additional water from an open and unsafe source into an already compromised system.  Now that we have repaired the piping to eliminate the massive leak, resulting in a resolution of long standing water supply issues, we know that this proposed solution would not only been fiscally irresponsible, but would have most likely made the situation significantly worse by potentially rupturing additional pipe sections in other areas as well as forcing more pressurized water out of the existing (already massive) leak.

A special thanks to all the VE residents who came out as a community to help me when asked especially Michael Burd who participated in the testing and calculations. The new SC has also been extremely supportive and been on site of the excavations and repairs numerous times.  

Also a special thank you to the VE developer/resort management who provided the laborers and tradesmen who worked tirelessly over the last few weeks not only in excavating numerous sections of pipe but demonstrating their professionalism in installing new valves and pipes.

I was glad to offer my service and solutions to those who encouraged me to do so.  I offered my services to find this leak over a year ago but was turned down by the "water chairman" and then SC. 

Ralf Henrich