Geothermal Source Field

Laying out pipe in the Geothermal source field


Vibrating screen used to create fill to bed the pipe


Pipes bedded and soil compacted as weather hits


Lake formed by the rain being pumped out


Ken Jenkins wife, Danette Jenkins mother of three and excavator operator for the family business created this hole and Gordon Heinrich and Dave Hines of Braxis Engineering along with my labor, laid out the tubing for the Geothermal source field. Assembly took about four hours but filling in the hole became a bit of a problem as we had a difficult time finding a vibrating screen to sift the soil for bedding the tubing. Stones could damage the pipe and hard soil clumps create air pockets around the pipe which reduces thermal connection with the soil. Once the equipment was located it took about one and a half days to sift enough soil to bed the tubing. We scrambled to get the first eighteen inches of fill in place and compacted as the snow and rain began. The following day I returned with a rented pump to empty the lake formed by the 1.5 inches of rain that fell.