Technology developments are allowing a much cheaper approach to monitoring the water levels in bore holes. These advancements mean that many more bore holes can be monitored and more data can be collected and a better model of the groundwater in a region can be achieved.
In the past, the cost to monitor hundreds of bore holes in a region was prohibitive, and only a small number could be monitored, and the monitoring was usually based on installing data loggers in the field and leaving them to collect data and then visiting site to collect the data. These processes are time consuming and expensive and wide area bore hole level and conductivity monitoring was not attempted.
Today, there are good quality lower cost pressure and conductivity sensors available and when these sensors are used with ultra low power data loggers and very low cost micro satellite telemetry and Lithium battery packs, a self contained Bore hole monitoring system which measures levels every 8 hours and transmits that date once per day can operate on a lithium battery pack for more than 10 years.
Such an equipment configuration is a breakthrough for groundwater monitoring because monitoring on a wide scale can be set up and monitored from a web browser in an office, and not visited on a routine basis for 10 years, which is more than the effective life of most equipment.
This presentation details the components of such systems, their accuracy and their reliability and especially their cost point and the trade offs to operate on a lithium battery pack for more than 10 years.