Delco Water Company is drilling test wells in northern Licking County in search of future water sources for its growing system.
Glenn Marzluf, general manager and chief operating officer of the utility based in Delaware County, said the member-owned, nonprofit cooperative is always looking for potential new sources and is generally interested in providing water to residents and businesses in areas where utilities aren’t currently available.
This comes at a time of increasing anxiety in Licking County about water use. The demand is growing exponentially because of rapid growth in general and high-volume use by data centers and other industrial users. Another concern in some areas is that access to water and sewer lines will increase the pace of development in areas where some residents are trying to maintain the rural character of their communities — Alexandria, Granville, Johnstown and their surrounding townships, in particular.
Delco, which primarily serves Delaware County and serves customers in parts of seven other counties, is also interested in buying the water system in the village of Utica. The village of about 2,100 residents at the crossroads of State Route 13 and U.S. Route 62 is near the test-well site, and Delco had an initial meeting earlier this year with village officials to express that interest, Marzluf said.
Test wells are being drilled in Washington Township on land along Ginger Hill Road, which runs east of State Route 13 just south of Velvet Ice Cream’s Ye Olde Mill restaurant.
Village Administrator Glen Richards said the village isn’t interested in selling, but Marzluf said that if Delco’s test wells indicate access to utility-scale volumes of water — at least 1 million gallons a day — the company likely would ask Utica officials for another meeting to explore future possibilities.
The test wells are being drilled in Washington Township on land along Ginger Hill Road, which runs east of State Route 13 just south of Velvet Ice Cream’s Ye Olde Mill restaurant. Marzluf said Delco is expecting to find between 3 million and 6 million gallons a day of sustained yield from a well or wells in Washington Township.
Delco has an option to purchase the farm on which the test wells are being drilled, and it will buy the farm if the test indicates the company could expect a sustained volume of 1 million or more gallons a day.
All of this has created concern among rural Washington Township residents about how the individual wells serving their farms and residences might be affected by the extraction of that volume of water.
“We had six or seven residents at our meeting two weeks ago who had some concerns,” said Washington Township Trustee Nelson Smith.
He said some had heard that Delco might be seeking a much higher number of gallons a day, which increased the level of concern.
“I don’t know that there’s anything we can do to stop it, but we want to be part of the discussion about it,” said Smith, who added that his own well and most others in the township are in the same aquifer being eyed by Delco. “Most township residents are going to be very concerned about giving up our water.”
He said that the Ohio Farm Bureau of Licking County is working to set up an informational meeting in the area within the next month or two to facilitate a conversation about the issue.
Smith said if Delco were to drill a well or wells, and it could provide water to Utica in the future, that might be acceptable, although he noted that Utica draws from the same aquifer and could drill its own wells if it needed more water. But another concern the trustees are hearing is that if Delco is “going to pipe that water from here to Delaware County,” that would be harder to swallow.
Marzluf said that Delco is not interested in trying to serve the Intel operation, which has a commitment from Columbus for up to 5 million gallons a day, or data centers in the area. And he said Delco is not interested in competing with other area utilities, such as Licking Regional Water District or the members of the Municipal Utility Coalition of Licking County — Alexandria, Granville and Johnstown.
“We understand the anxiety that comes with a development the size of Intel,” Marzluf said about Intel’s construction of a $28 billion computer-chip manufacturing campus just south of Johnstown. “Anxiety is the last thing we want here. We’d like to get ahead of that and let people know we are good neighbors,” he said.
Delco is interested in serving the rural areas of northern Licking County and southern Knox County, Marzluf said. And it would consider pumping water as far west as at least the northwest corner of Licking County, where the Hartford Fair managers and county commissioners have been seeking a reliable source of water for the fairgrounds.
“Our general interest is to serve areas that are not being served,” he said. “We are not interested in competing, and we’re not going to step on anyone’s toes. We’re interested in going where we’re wanted.”
He said the company is not currently looking at any other sites in Licking County, but he said Delco would be interested in looking at sites in southern Knox County. “If something were available, we would consider it,” he said.
County Commissioner Tim Bubb said the commissioners are aware of Delco’s interest in Licking County, and they don’t object to Delco being in the county if it serves the interests of Licking County residents.
“We’ve heard some concerns from the township — people wondering what they’re (Delco) doing up there,” Bubb said. “We have nothing against Delco. Wherever they go, they do a credible job.”
He acknowledged the county’s interest in a reliable water source for the Hartford Fairgrounds in the far northwestern corner of the county — a short distance from the borders of Delaware and Knox counties. Bubb said the county had asked Johnstown years ago to supply water, but the city wasn’t interested at the time.
He said the commissioners are not aware of any economic development plans for northern Licking County that might be served immediately by a new water source, but he said that if Delco “proves to be a viable option, residents could be better off with a reliable source of water.”
Alan Miller writes for TheReportingProject.org, the nonprofit news organization of Denison University’s Journalism program, which is supported by generous donations from readers. Sign up for The Reporting Project newsletter online.
This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Delco water utility eyes Utica, Hartford, Washington Township