Results from test wells drilled at two sites near Alexandria and one near Granville to locate possible water sources for the Intel computer-chip manufacturing campus in New Albany found the potential for up to 9.3 million gallons a day.
And while a promise from the State of Ohio to find water sources for the Intel campus prompted and paid for the testing in the Raccoon Creek valley, it appears no one is in a rush to tap the sources. Intel has repeatedly delayed its production start date, now targeted for 2031, and the City of Columbus has said it will provide Intel’s water needs of about 5 million gallons a day when it starts making chips.
Officials from New Albany and Granville have said they don’t have immediate needs for water and more study is needed.
Granville Village Manager Herb Koehler said Granville water customers in Granville and Alexandria “should be cautiously encouraged by the relatively low-volume conclusion for the (Granville Township) site, and that the study takes into consideration nearby residential wells when talking about whether it becomes a production well.”
He said they also should know “that Granville’s position hasn’t changed – that while we support responsible regional water development, any development should include controls to protect the aquifer, our well field and our residents.”
Koehler said Granville officials and the two engineering firms they hired to work alongside the firms hired by the City of New Albany “see the study as a step toward protection of the aquifer and not a rush to develop,” and that he hopes that “any consideration of removal of water” would be done in consultation with Granville.
The relationship between Granville and New Albany regarding water resources got off to a rocky start after the New Albany Company bought 106 acres of farmland from former Granville Township Trustee Dan VanNess and the City of New Albany filed a request with the Licking County Planning and Development office in 2024 to drill test wells. That set off alarm bells in Granville Village Hall, and after an airing of concerns, New Albany regrouped and included Granville in the testing.
| Read more: After a rocky start to a relationship, New Albany and Granville will work together on a water well test
“The testing was a fact-finding effort designed to provide objective information about groundwater conditions in western Licking County,” said Adrienne Mayfield, a spokesperson for the City of New Albany. “Now that the testing is complete and the findings have been received, the City of New Albany and other participating localities are reviewing the information. Because that review is still underway, we do not have additional information to share about next steps at this time.”
Mayfield said New Albany “facilitated the study as part of a broader commitment by numerous local, regional, and state stakeholders following Intel’s decision to locate its investment in central Ohio.” She said collaboration with officials from the Village of Granville, St. Albans Township, Village of Alexandria, Licking County and the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency “helped contribute to a better understanding of the area’s groundwater resources, and the information gathered through this process will be a valuable resource for all of us as we plan for the future.”
| Read more: New Albany’s search for water for Intel goes far beyond Granville
Two of the three testing sites are in St. Albans Township, bookending the Village of Alexandria, and the third is just west of Granville on land the New Albany Company bought from VanNess.
Testing and analysis to account for variables such as drought conditions showed the Granville Township site, explored in the fall of 2025, could produce about 2.2 million gallons a day beyond the 1 million gallons a day the Village of Granville draws from the same aquifer a short distance east of the test site, according to a report by Eagon & Associates prepared for the City of New Albany.
A property on the west side of Alexandria that Eagon included in the report was studied in 2021-22. It straddles Raccoon Creek and is about 28 acres within a 236-acre property owned by Harmony Realty II Ltd., which is home to Brookside Materials Sand & Gravel and Kurtz Brothers Top Soil & Mulch. That site could produce about 4.3 million gallons a day, according to the report.
Downstream, on the southeast side of Alexandria, engineers did well tests in 2026 on property owned by James Geiger that also has been the proposed site of asphalt- and concrete-mixing facilities that drew protests from area residents. The results of the well test there show it could produce 3 million gallons a day.
The actual 72-hour test of the Granville Township site along Raccoon Creek and just north of Moots Run Road produced 4.02 million gallons of water a day. But the Eagon report notes that contamination at the former Granville Solvents property, which is adjacent to the Granville wellfield and was a Superfund environmental clean-up site for 15 years, is a limiting factor in the amount of water that could be drawn from the aquifer.
“Groundwater at the Granville Solvents site is contaminated with chlorinated solvents, and any change in groundwater flow direction east of the Granville Well Field could cause contaminant migration toward the Village wells,” the report says. “The need to avoid potential impacts to groundwater levels at the Granville Solvents site during testing and any future groundwater supply development and operation was recognized, and was a key limitation in evaluation of the available groundwater capacity.”
The Granville Solvents site along the TJ Evans Path near the Columbus Road/Cherry Street viaduct has been a longtime concern.
Granville Solvents operated from 1958 until 1986 and stored specialty fuels and chemicals used in the printing and dry-cleaning businesses in underground tanks and above-ground barrels, The Advocate reported in 2020. The company closed in the late 1980s, and an inspection in 1990 revealed that some of the tanks and drums had leaked, causing high levels of contamination in the soil and groundwater.
It was declared an EPA Superfund site, and it took nearly 15 years to clean up the site.
The plume of toxic chemicals from the defunct company has been stationary in the aquifer under Granville for decades. A plume occurs when contaminants are concentrated in a particular place underground – like an oil slick on the ocean.
An engineering firm monitoring the plume on behalf of the U.S.Environmental Protection Agency has told Granville village officials that any future wells west of the village drawing millions of gallons of water a day could pull that toxic plume into the village’s well field and pollute drinking water supplies.
Koehler said that “it appears, ironically, that our Granville Solvents site is now protecting the well field.”
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 here.