Abstract: A method and system for removing non-aqueous phase liquids (NAPL) from geologic media below the surface of the ground, employing a flexible liner disposed down a borehole. A flexible carrier liner has an absorbent outer cover composed of a NAPL-absorbent outer layer and a NAPL-absorbent inner layer, both preferably hydrophobic. The liner with outer cover is placed down the borehole, preferably but not necessarily by eversion. Liner placement presses the absorbent outer layer against the borehole wall. NAPL in the groundwater adjacent the outer layer is absorbed into the outer layer and then wicked into the inner layer. The liner and outer cover can then be extracted from the borehole to remove from the subsurface the NAPL absorbed in the cover's absorbent layers. If portions of the liner are transparent, a down-hole camera may be deployed to monitor the degree of NAPL absorption in the absorbent inner layer.

Abstract: A method and system using the measured adsorption of a tracer substance leached from a flexible liner sealing a subterranean borehole to indicate the flow of fluid, typically water, past the borehole. The liner is provided with contaminant collectors. The liner is impregnated in its fabrication with a tracer substance. The tracer is leached from the liner as water flows past the liner in/from fractures in the surrounding geologic formation. The water containing any leached tracer may also flow past the collectors. The collectors adsorb the tracer relative to the amount of tracer leached from the liner and into the passing water, and the concentration of tracer in the flowing water is proportional to the amount of toluene leached from the liner. The tracer level in a collector is tested as an indication of the flow past the liner.

Abstract: A method and system for steering the direction of propagation of a flexible liner everting under a driving fluid pressure. There is provided a method for controlling and guiding directionally the eversion of the flexible liner into a borehole that penetrates a subsurface (e.g., subterranean) void with a diameter substantially exceeding the nominal diameter of the borehole. Further, liner propagation by eversion can be controlled outside of a borehole and when unconstrained by a borehole, such as on or beneath the surface of a body of water.

Abstract: A method and system for supporting unstable geologic materials surrounding a borehole after the borehole is drilled, while reducing the vertical migration in a sand pack behind a slotted screen in the casing. An annulus is defined between a drill casing and a continuous screened casing. Alternating sand fills and sealing layers are deposed in the annulus along a length of the borehole. The length of the sealed interval between the screened casing and the hole wall is reduced, allowing flow connection between the surrounding geologic formation and the interior of the casing over most of the casing length. The sand pack design between the screen and the borehole wall has a sufficient number of sealed barriers to vertical flow to approximate an ideal sand backpacking, which has a vertical conductivity no greater than that of the formation and a relatively low impedance to horizontal flow through the sand pack.

Abstract: A method and apparatus for installing a flexible liner directly into a pipe or borehole without everting the liner. The liner is lowered directly, without eversion, into either a cased borehole with slotted screens, or in an uncased borehole, without the hazard of abrasion of the liner. A removable protective sheath temporarily disposed around the liner avoids damaging penetration of the liner during installation. By the invention, it is possible to include tubing and other measuring and sampling devices attached to the liner that are too stiff to be included on an everting liner. Means and methods for releasably attaching the sheath to the liner, and for anchoring the liner in a borehole, are provided.

Abstract: A method and system using the measured adsorption of a tracer substance leached from a flexible liner sealing a subterranean borehole to indicate the flow of fluid, typically water, past the borehole. The liner is provided with contaminant collectors. The liner is impregnated in its fabrication with a tracer substance. The tracer is leached from the liner as water flows past the liner in/from fractures in the surrounding geologic formation. The water containing any leached tracer may also flow past the collectors. The collectors adsorb the tracer relative to the amount of tracer leached from the liner and into the passing water, and the concentration of tracer in the flowing water is proportional to the amount of toluene leached from the liner. The tracer level in a collector is tested as an indication of the flow past the liner.

Abstract: A method and system to increase or maintain pressure within a flexible liner within a subterranean borehole, such as may be deployed to perform subsurface groundwater sampling. The liner is slightly larger than the borehole and pressurized with an interior fluid pressure so as to urge the liner into intimate contact with the borehole wall. The system and method utilize a weighted “sealing wellhead” assembly placed upon an inverted upper end of the liner. The action force of the sealing wellhead increases or maintains the liner's interior fluid pressure. This method and system are generally practiced with a water-filled liner and with a liner with relatively simple attachments.

Abstract: A method and system for supporting unstable geologic materials surrounding a borehole after the borehole is drilled, while reducing the vertical migration in a sand pack behind a slotted screen in the casing. An annulus is defined between a drill casing and a continuous screened casing. Alternating sand fills and sealing layers are deposed in the annulus along a length of the borehole. The length of the sealed interval between the screened casing and the hole wall is reduced, allowing flow connection between the surrounding geologic formation and the interior of the casing over most of the casing length. The sand pack design between the screen and the borehole wall has a sufficient number of sealed barriers to vertical flow to approximate an ideal sand backpacking, which has a vertical conductivity no greater than that of the formation and a relatively low impedance to horizontal flow through the sand pack.

Abstract: A method and apparatus for installing a flexible liner directly into a pipe or borehole without everting the liner. The liner is lowered directly, without eversion, into either a cased borehole with slotted screens, or in an uncased borehole, without the hazard of abrasion of the liner. A removable protective sheath temporarily disposed around the liner avoids damaging penetration of the liner during installation. By the invention, it is possible to include tubing and other measuring and sampling devices attached to the liner that are too stiff to be included on an everting liner. Means and methods for releasably attaching the sheath to the liner, and for anchoring the liner in a borehole, are provided.

Abstract: A system and method for performing a flexible liner inversion out from a low-permeability borehole. A flexible liner may be installed by eversion down a subterranean borehole to selectively seal the borehole. Such a liner may be removed from the borehole by inverting it up the borehole. Water is added into the borehole beneath the lowest end of the liner, to permit or facilitate inversion of the liner. Water is allowed to flow from the interior of the liner to the borehole space beneath the liner, thereby raising the pressure in the unsealed borehole beneath the liner, and thereby allowing the liner to be further inverted upward. By allowing water to flow from the liner interior to a borehole volume beneath the liner, the need for a long vent or pumping tube is avoided.

Abstract: A simplified system and method for lining a borehole in the Earth's surface. The liner has a tubing sleeve disposed upon the interior liner wall surrounding and defining the liner's interior volume when the liner is installed within a borehole. This compact and relatively lightweight system simplifies the modes and methods of subsurface installation. Each of at least one tubing sleeve preferably contains and holds at least one slender sample tubes for transporting borehole sample water (or water pressure change data) from a liner sampling spacer to above the ground's surface. The method is a relatively inexpensive, and allows for the sealing of a borehole to define various different sampling intervals with an external spacer at each liner port, and to use tubing directly to the surface from each port, to perform various subsurface sampling and monitoring functions.

Abstract: A method and system for determining the depth to a water level, particularly depth to a ground water table below Earth's surface. The method can be used to measure the depth to a water table when the only access to the aquifer is a slender tube. A measured quantity of gas is injected into a sealed volume, while recording the pressure change in that volume, allowing a deduction of the size of the sealed volume. Using measurements of the sealed volume and the dimension of the tube containing that volume, the depth to the water level can be calculated.

Abstract: A method and system for performing fluid flow tracing through a medium, such as the geologic formation surrounding a subterranean borehole, or the environment around a pipe or conduit. A transparent liner is everted into the borehole. A marker fluid from the surrounding medium emerges from the wall of the borehole and is allowed to contact the liner, or a cover of the liner, to create a stain thereon that is visible with a camera lowered into the liner interior.

Abstract: A system and method for performing a flexible liner eversion into, or an inversion out from, a low-permeability borehole. A flexible liner may be installed by eversion down a subterranean borehole in order to selectively seal the borehole. Such a liner may be removed from the borehole by inverting it up the borehole. Water is removed by pumping from the borehole beneath the lowest end of the borehole, to facilitate eversion of the liner. Water is added, by pumping water into the borehole beneath the lowest end of the liner, to permit or facilitate inversion of the liner.

Abstract: A method for sealing a flexible liner that has been emplaced in a borehole manifesting artesian water flow. The upper end of the liner is closed with a plug, and a mud tube is extended from the plug down to a small volume of mud at the bottom end of the liner. The pressure in the liner interior is increased according to the weight of the mud column in the mud tube. Pressure in the liner interior can be regulated by allowing mud to move up and down in the mud tube, and by adding or withdrawing water from the closed liner interior.

Abstract: An apparatus and method for facilitating eversion of a flexible liner down a borehole when an artesian head condition is producing a rate of water flow out of the top of the borehole. A bypass pipe channels artesian flow, moving upward in the borehole and/or well casing, past an everting flexible liner to a wellhead fixture. Artesian flow arriving at the wellhead fixture is pumped away to ameliorate resistance to liner eversion otherwise presented by the water flow. A heavy mud may be disposed inside the everting liner further to promote its downward eversion past the artesian flow.

Abstract: A simplified system and method for lining a borehole in the Earth's surface. The liner has a tubing sleeve disposed upon the interior liner wall surrounding and defining the liner's interior volume when the liner is installed within a borehole. This compact and relatively lightweight system simplifies the modes and methods of subsurface installation. Each of at least one tubing sleeve preferably contains and holds at least one slender sample tubes for transporting borehole sample water (or water pressure change data) from a liner sampling spacer to above the ground's surface. The method is a relatively inexpensive, and allows for the sealing of a borehole to define various different sampling intervals with an external spacer at each liner port, and to use tubing directly to the surface from each port, to perform various subsurface sampling and monitoring functions.

Abstract: A method and system for determining the depth to a water level, particularly depth to a ground water table below Earth's surface. The method can be used to measure the depth to a water table when the only access to the aquifer is a slender tube. A measured quantity of gas is injected into a sealed volume, while recording the pressure change in that volume, allowing a deduction of the size of the sealed volume. Using measurements of the sealed volume and the dimension of the tube containing that volume, the depth to the water level can be calculated.

Abstract: Methods and systems for allowing the use of very small-diameter sample tubing, with a flexible borehole liner, in multi-level water sampling systems deployed in subsurface boreholes. Methods are disclosed for determining depth distances to a ground water table, in a borehole, without the need to lower a pressure transducer into a sampling tube.

Abstract: A system for measuring a profile of a hydraulic head. A flexible liner is everted down the borehole. The profile of the transmissivity of the geologic media is obtained during (and indirectly from) the eversion of the flexible liner as it proceeds down the borehole. The liner is then retrieved by inversion from the borehole, while the pressure head in the borehole fluid below the liner is monitored and measured. From the previously obtained transmissivity profile, and the measured head within the borehole, the hydraulic head in the geologic media surrounding the borehole is determined for borehole intervals. A complete hydraulic head profile may be obtained from the collected data.