Water Well / Poço de água

[nelsonic]

Our plan @home is to be as water-efficient as possible. We have already invested in water-saving taps, showers and appliances and will continue to conserve as much as we can. Water is a scarce resource even if it's relatively cheap it's should never be wasted.

Inside the house we will be using water supplied by Agere (the water company) but in the garden we want to use rain water. We intend to capture as much rain water as we can and store it in an underground tank.

Thankfully Braga has an abundant supply of water. both on the surface and under ground.
There are two year-round rivers near the house and several streams.

Rio Este (East River) passes 200m from the house.

This means the groundwater is well supplied.

Visual explanation of "What Is Groundwater?" https://youtu.be/oNWAerr_xEE
If you're new to water well drilling, watch this: https://youtu.be/0-KLWEnwiaY

The elevation of the Braga House is around 160m (above sea level)
http://www.floodmap.net/Elevation/ElevationMap/?gi=2742032

The Este river is 10m lower than the house and the water table is 25m below the house.
From asking around, we have determined that several houses in the area have wells.

Law: https://www.hidrofuros.pt/legislacao

According to this FAQ on the site, we do not have to obtain a license for a well:

Todo

• Finalise design for Water Treatment (underground) room: Waste Water Treatment phase-three#48
• Discuss the idea of having a Well with @iteles
• Contact potential suppliers (RFP)
  • https://www.hidrofuros.pt/contactos
  • Triáguas
  • Sr. Martins via Carlos
• Arrange a site visits for all 3
• Receive quotes
  • https://www.hidrofuros.pt/contactos
  • Triáguas
  • Sr. Martins via Carlos
• Chose supplier based on both price and availability
• Send through required documents for paperwork
  • Cópia do cartão de cidadão ou bilhete de identidade e contribuinte do requerente
  • Caderneta Predial ou Registo Predial do terreno
  • Declaração de cedência LFT se necessário
  • Requerimento de licença assinados
  • Procuração assinada (so they can act on our behalf)
  • Comprovativo de morada
  • Payment of the license 209,10€ (170,00€+IVA)
• Confirm license requests have been handed in
• Get license from the town council to occupy the public walkway for the works
  • Find the right forms from 'Ocupação de via' license to hook up to electricity #84 & check these are the most current version
  • Fill in form & sign
  • Attach additional documents required
  • Scan form
  • Burn CD with form
  • Hand in at town council
• Receive permissions for the hole from water authorities
• Receive and pay for license from the town council to occupy the public walkway for the works
• Hand in comunicação de inicio de trabalhos de obras isentos de controlo prévio
  • Find the right form under 'Urbanismo - Outros'
  • Fill in form, print & sign
  • Obtain and attach permission from water authorities required
  • Scan form
  • Burn CD with form
  • Hand in at town council
• Viability study
• Book in the work

[nelsonic]

Yesterday we spoke to Carlos about getting a quote from the guy he has used in the past for wells.
I still think it's worth contacting Hidrofuros.pt (see above) for a consultation/quote as they can ensure that we stay below the 5 Cv and thus don't have to waste time with the council/agere...

[iteles]

@nelsonic In the meantime, today I spoke to:

• José Martins from Hidrofuros, who immediately mentioned a license would be needed with the Agência Portuguesa do Ambiente (which apparently takes its sweet time) - he mentioned they're incredibly buys at the moment; and
• Bruno Vieira from Triáguas, recommended by my uncle (the civil engineer)

Both told me someone would call me back with times to come and give us a quote.

[iteles]

Hidrofuros has given us a detailed quote, estimating 100metres, which comes to €4,710 + IVA, totalling €5,793.

Note that they are assuming that additional tubing will be required and additional digging because there is a layer of very soft earth they need to get through first which would collapse in on itself if we were to stop digging too soon.

It includes prices for the following:

Awaiting other quotes.

[iteles]

José from Triáguas has said that he'll get it to us today or Monday.

In other news, the only place that the machinery appears to fit is on the garage side of the house, so whatever happens, we'll have to do what we've been trying to avoid which is to open a hole all the way from the garage to the entrance to connect the furo to the water and residual waste system of the house.

Whilst we're there, we can resolve the guttering situation as well #67 👍

[iteles]

Triáguas quote

They claim that they dig a slightly wider hole than most companies but it seems the tubing is the same width so I find this difficult to believe 🤷‍♀

This plus IVA means the total is €6014.70.

They also have a slightly more expensive version where there is a more resistant tube:

This version would total €5,390 + IVA or €6,629 all in.

Note that for both of these there is an outstanding cost of the connection between the furo and the pressure balloon but this shouldn't be that much in the greater scheme.

Sr. Martins

In comparison, I feel that this one might end up being more expensive because they're refusing to give us any figures up front.

We've been told €25/m for the hole itself which is on par with the other companies, but around €30/m for the tubing which is actually a bit more expensive than the others.

Having said this, the problem really is that they are specialise in the hole but then 'could' do the bomba and the rest but 'we'd see later'.

Conclusion

I'm personally more keen to go with Triáguas ou Hidrofuros.

I'll do a comparison in the next comment.

[iteles]

Having looked into this, the quotes are much of a muchness - the only difference is connecting that Triáguas doesn't account for the amount of metres needed to connect the furo to the balão de pressão and this is €5/m. I will email them to ask what this is exactly so we can factor it in

Other than that it seems that the Triáguas piping is wider and the overall quote (excepting the above is actually a smidge less).

Finally, Triáguas is most likely the more professional company of the 3.

I am leaning towards Triáguas personally. I don't fully grasp the value of their more expensive quote and will look into it. I suspect that this is maybe needed for softer soil (as is our case) and just hasn't been taken into account in the other quotes.

[iteles]

@nelsonic Please let me know your thoughts on the above!

[nelsonic]

@iteles agree that the Triáguas proposal is preferable because it includes a more complete solution. 👍

[iteles]

I have updated the OP with the list of documents necessary (which I am gathering).

Caderneta predial can be found at the following path on the 'Finanças' website - note, URL was useless:

[iteles]

Have gathered all the documents except one document that needs to be signed by previous owner, which I have requested.

I tried paying the fee today but the IBAN we were given is incorrect so I have requested the right one.

Once I have these together, I also want to ask the guy to come over so we can discuss where all the pipes will go, so that we can have a shared understanding and start closing holes in the garden.

[nelsonic]

@iteles sounds good.
I'm going to re-draw the Sunroom #14 in Fusion 360 so that it can be contextualised with the Water Well.

[iteles]

I was sent the right IBAN (fastest email reply I ever got and on a Sunday 😆) and payment has been made and accepted.

[iteles]

The engineer is coming past tomorrow (24-Jan-2020, 10h00) at my request to review the placement of the canalizações so that we know which holes in the garden we can close and which we can't.

I will be calling the plumbers ahead of this to get their understanding of how the plumbing system works.

@nelsonic You have mentioned in the past that you would like to use the water well for our garden needs but if we can hook it up to allow usage in our flushes at home as well, this may be worth it until we have a water recycling plant?

[nelsonic]

@iteles indeed. if the plumbers left the separate pipes for the flushing, we should use the (filtered) well water. 👍

[iteles]

We caught up with the engineers and determined a few things:

• The request for a license for the well is now already underway
• We need the piping for the well to affix to a pressure gauge (balão de pressão) - this machine will be located inside the pool machine room at a cost of €5/m
• Pipes will then go from the machine room, alongside the pool to get to the water recycling facility area and be fed into the piping for the flushes
  • Note that we will have to be responsible for digging the paths for this piping
• The garden taps will also have to be fed from this room so that's another lot of piping because they cannot come directly from the well as this would mess with the water pressure before it got to the pressure gauge & throw off the measurements
• The only way to guarantee that the tree routes will not pierce the piping of the well itself is to use the reinforced, twisted piping (or so they say) which is of course the most expensive option

This leaves us with a couple of open questions:

• Which route will the underground plumbing to the pool machine room take? Can it follow the back wall and would this be wise given Sunroom (Greenhouse/Multi-purpose Dining/Creative/Workshop Room) ? #14 for maintenance purposes? Or should it follow alongside the house?
• Are we happy to confirm we want to move ahead with this in light of the increased costs and a lot of piping?

The tasks to get the license from the council have also already been added to the OP.

[iteles]

Having spoken to the council at length today, it appears the architect has approved the process but it's stuck somewhere. He wasn't in today so I couldn't find out where. The lady asked me to send in an email (municipe@cm-braga.pt) because with the lockdown, they'll have to figure out the problem, push everything forward, generate a payment reference and then post the license to us once it's been paid 🤦‍♀

So with LUCK we'll have it for the 14th April.

I've emailed and will call on Thursday if we haven't heard.

[iteles]

We heard back last Thursday (8-Apr-2020) with a pretty useless email where it was clear that the lady hadn't actually read my email, just assumed she knew the issue and directed me to do everything I'd already done. I called the council and a nice dude commiserated for me and told me that there was no one he could pass me to because everyone is working from home but told me where to request that my email be redirected correctly (which I did).

Today we received an email asking us to make the payment for the license, but the payment details are only available in 48 hours:

In the meantime, they've been kind enough to send off our request for signing off and will email us the license however, they've so far been very evasive of my questions on the timing of this.
Whilst I understand, they've also clarified that (as per last time), the license will become valid as soon as it is issued so we HAVE to know the timing in order to book the team!

I've emailed again for clarification.

Also, updated the ongoing budget with the final costs of the license, €99,75.

[iteles]

Yesterday I got a phone call from the town council to say that our license was ready and as soon as it was signed it would be sent to us, within 24 hours.

I followed up with the water well people who have been working on their scheduling for next week.

The license hasn't been emailed to us yet but I agree with the water well people that we would catch up again on Monday with them, with a view to starting the 2 days of work on Tuesday or Wednesday of next week, 21 or 22-Apr-2020 (depending on whether we have the license and whether they are able to finish their current job and free up the equipment by the end of Monday).

I also raised the question of the work to be done connecting the water well to the main systems of the house. The recommendation was that this work should be done after the well has been dug and should be discussed on site on Wednesday.

I will speak to Carlos Pinheiro about getting the equipment to dig the path for the tubing towards the end of the week.

[iteles]

I have spent a decent portion of the morning on the phone with the town council and we now have our license for the work to be carried out between 20th (today) and the 24th April 2020.

I have spoken to Triáguas, who will confirm by the end of the day whether the work will begin tomorrow or Wednesday, depending on the availability of their machines. If the work does start tomorrow (Tuesday 21 April 2020), it will only begin in the afternoon as the machines will need to travel to us in the morning.

[nelsonic]

@iteles the time has finally come for us to resolve all the pipes/plumbing for the well. 🎉
Could you please call/email on Monday Morning to find out when they can be here? 🤙
We just need them to tell us what needs to be done in terms of pipes. 🚧
Then we can book in when they are next available to come and help get the work done. 🙏

[iteles]

Spoke to José Mota who confirmed they will come out this week to review:

1. Positioning of pipes + budget for this
2. Whether we can rig up anything temporary to fill the pool Getting the swimming pool/spa/sauna completed #237

Will speak again this week to confirm when.

[nelsonic]

@iteles thanks for following up. 👌

[iteles]

Dropping this here because I have to run but will follow up with a detailed comparison to the original orçamento later:

[nelsonic]

@iteles really hope this includes all their work and there are no surprises. 🤞

[iteles]

In a side by side comparison, given how much material costs have gone up, the quote hasn't gone up as much as I thought it might from 2020:

• Fornecimento & montagem da electrobomba: Up €90, from €1330 to €1220
• Fornecimento & montagem do balão de pressão: Up €190, from €490 to €680 (note that there is a more expensive option available here for €880 and a capacidade de 300 litros em vez de 200 litros
• Fornecimento & colocação da caixa de proteção: Up €20 from €60 to €80 but the previous quote was in betão com tampa de ferro galvanizado and this quote is for a box 'em fibra' 🤷
• Ligações electricas e hidraulicas has gone up from €5 to €7.50 a meter 🙃

This new quote comes with all the measurements correctly entered though which is a plus. I'm confident there is no 'hidden work' with these guys and we already know they're not doing the taps.

Old on the left, new on the right.

[nelsonic]

The price is still perfectly reasonable provided we use the water! 👌

[iteles]

@nelsonic Agreed. Can I call them Monday first thing and book in the work?
Is there anything that needs to be completed on our side before they can start?

[nelsonic]

There is quite a lot we need to do to prep for the installation of the pipes. I was kinda hoping that Miguel would have more progress on the retaining walls … ⏳

[nelsonic]

Gotta prepare the ground for the pipes this week: #270

[nelsonic]

@iteles please call the Water Well People on Monday Morning #271 🙏

[iteles]

Updated #271 accordingly.

[nelsonic]

Thank you. I will do everything possible to get the area prepared for their arrival so we can get this done this week! 🎉

[iteles]

Herculean effort from @nelsonic with some last minute help from our labourer Miguel on the day of, and this was done:

I'm not chasing them for payment but I'm assuming this will go through PTCo so we can get IVA back?
If so, those are the details they have and we'll await an invoice.