Simulation studies are presented to examine the thermaland economic performance of standing column wells with andwithout groundwater bleed in different locations in the UnitedStates. The simulations are based on a simplified standingcolumn well model that has been integrated into an hourlybuilding energy simulation program. The required designdepth and energy costs from standing column well systems arecompared with that of single U-tube closed-loop systems.Results show that the standing column well systems requireless borehole length. A comparative life-cycle cost analysis isconducted considering 20 year system operation.