Reliable supply of hydrocarbon raw material extractors of the Türkmennebit State Concern with technical and industrial water is the responsibility of the employees of the Water Supply Directorate. Also, one of the main tasks of this Enterprise is to fully meet the needs of most settlements, where oil workers live, in drinking water.
The fact that over the first nine months of this year, the Enterprise has completed work worth 5 million 147 thousand manats indicates the high efficiency of the Directorate’s activities. The Enterprise’s specialists successfully cope with the drainage of water for industrial purposes not only from underground Lake Yasga, but also from vertical wells of various deposits, as well as the waters of the Caspian Sea. During the reporting period, the Directorate pumped 2 million 366 thousand cubic meters of water, thus fully satisfying consumer orders. Of these, 1.4 million cubic meters is clean drinking water, the rest is industrial and technical water.
In order to achieve production success, a thorough analysis is carried out in the relevant departments of the Enterprise, the available opportunities are properly used, and all work is carried out in accordance with the requirements. Also, in accordance with the Resolution of the President of Turkmenistan on improving the provision of settlements in the Balkan velayat with clean drinking water, a series of construction and repair work has been implemented at the Yasga underground water reservoir over the past few years. Drilling new wells at 49 elevations and the successful implementation of additional repair and restoration work in them ensured the effectiveness of the work performed.
Underground Lake Yasga is one of the wonders of Turkmen nature. This is nothing more than a miracle that brackish and fresh waters are adjacent to each other at a depth of tens or even hundreds of meters in the bowels of the earth. Salt water from underground is diverted into a separate lake on the surface. It would be appropriate to give some information on the natural structure of this unique underground lake, which has no analogues in size and volume. It is located 125 kilometers east of Balkanabat, in the Karakum Desert, and has a length of 60 kilometers and a width of 25 kilometers.
The water of this amazing underground lake has been effectively used by the Türkmennebit State Concern for almost 70 years. Each of the 49 wells, located at a distance of five hundred meters from each other at the Yasga field, is operated using the technology of pumping water using the cluster method with the help of two paired wells simultaneously – one with fresh water and the other with salt water. This technique allows maintaining the state of the layers at the same level. Then the fresh water is sent for drinking purposes to the population, and the salt water is used for technical needs in production. The operating mode of the wells, the ratio of the flow rate of fresh and salt water, the displacement of their boundaries, the cycle of the pumps and filters, changes in mineralization and other technological processes are monitored by operators and engineering and technical workers of the Directorate. The average depths of wells with fresh and brackish water in the underground lake are up to 90 meters and 123 meters, respectively. A control well with an average depth of 108 meters ensures the stability of fresh and salt water to prevent them from merging.
Underground Lake Yasga, as a unique reservoir in the bed of the ancient Uzboy, is an amazing natural landmark. Its relief and landscape are of a relict nature, the lake and the adjacent territory are of ecological and tourist significance.
The above-ground lake, five kilometers long, shaped like a horseshoe and located on the left bank of the ancient Uzboy, is divided by a dam into a freshwater lake and a brackish lake. The freshwater lake is 1,000 meters long, 40 to 150 meters wide and 5.5 meters deep. The volume of fresh water in this reservoir is about 220 thousand cubic meters. The lake with brackish water is 1.5 kilometers long with an average width of 100 meters and a depth of 2 meters. Both lakes are fed by underground waters.
Fresh water pumped from Lake Yasga is supplied round the clock through pipelines to the towns of Balkanabat and Gumdag and the settlements of Uzboy, Goturdepe, and purified drinking water from the complex of seawater desalination plants on the Caspian coast is supplied to the town of Ekerem and other settlements. The industrial waters of the Caspian Sea are widely used in the industrial development of oil and gas fields and the construction of industrial and cultural facilities, buildings and residential buildings, and the technical waters of such areas as Garagyjak, Balaýşem and Jebel are used in the improvement of the outskirts of settlements.
Source: «Nebit-gaz» newspaper
