Good Morning Joe,

Thank you for submitting additional data from Hatfield’s Ferry. We believe that this will be helpful for evaluating comments regarding treatment of FGD wastewater. We would like to ask you some follow

- up questions to ensure that we understand the submitt ed

data. We understand that it may be difficult to locate some records because of the deactivation of the facility, however we would appreciate any input that you can offer.

These are the specific questions we would appreciate your input on regarding th e Excel Spreadsheet that you sent us a couple of weeks ago.

1. What method was used for Arsenic in column D (AS

- Arsenic) and Column E (HGTGEO

- Mercury, Trace, Geochemical Labs)? The MDL is included on the spreadsheet, but we don't know what the quantitation limit and the reporting limit are. Arsenic results in column D were analyzed by 200.7 (ICP) . The mercury data from Geochemical Labs was by 245.7. Mercury results pr esented in Columns F & G were also analyzed by Geochemical Labs. Note that Column G is a duplicate of Column F

– see explanation

to question #4 below. The West Virginia Department of Environmental

Protection (WVDEP) requires us to report down to the MDL on our Dis charge Monitoring Reports (DMRs). To be consistent in our reporting across all facilities regardless of location (State)

, Allegheny

’s and now FirstEnergy’s labs report their data to the MDL on our DMRs. The data provided in this spreadsheet was su bmitted to the PADEP on
Hatfield ’s DMRs. With that being said, the quantitation level for column D arsenic results from FirstEnergy’s lab is 0.03 mg/L and the mercury quantitation level for Geochemical is 0.03 μg/L

.

2. In Column D (AS

- Arsenic) one value is reported as <MDL and several are reported as 0. What exactly does a reported value of "0" mean? Were these samples also below the MDL? Does this mean the sample was a nondetect? A zero means the analysis

return ed a result below the MDL. Initially, our Laboratory Information Management System (LIMS) software would only accept numeric entries . To avoid error messages

when entering data below the MDL

, numeric value

s less than the MDL w e re entered into

the database. Sometimes zeros were entered and other times actual values , values below
the MDL, from the instrument were entered into the database. Any value entered that

was below the MDL returned a less than the MDL value on the DMR. The software has

since progressed and can now handle alpha entries such as <MDL. On the DMR, the actual numeric value for the MDL is returned (e.g. < 0.03 mg/L). Also, in order to calculate averages, values that returned a <MDL may have been converted on the spreadsheet to zero ( 0 ) , per EPA

’s guidance for calculating averages when some of the data is b e low the

MDL.3. In Column E (HGTGEO

- Mercury, Trace, Geochemical Labs) several values are

reported as 0. What exactly does a reported value of "0" mean? Were these samples also below the MDL? Does this mean the sample was a nondetect? Yes, see above explanation

to question #

2

.

4. What is the difference between Column F and Column G, both of which are labeled Hg (245.7)? They are identical. Is the unit on Column G a typo? Yes. Should they both be ug/L? Yes! (The same numbers are reported in the two columns, but the units are different) Why is the sample from 9/17/2013 listed as below MDL in Column F and zero in

Column G? This is a typo. Somehow when I transfer red the data to the

spreadsheet

C olumn F was duplicated in Column G

. Column F and G are identical and the units are in micrograms per liter (μg/L) for both columns. The mg/L listed in Column G is a typo. I suggest you delete Column G. T he 9/17/2013 sample in Column G had the MDL converted to zero in order to calculate the average and obtain the proper sample count. I

n my hurry to get this to you by the deadline , I missed it

. Sorry for the confusion! Also, since Geochemical Labs analyzed the data presented in Columns E & F and the only difference is that the data was pulled from two different LIMS bec ause of the switchover from Allegheny to FirstEnergy, the columns could be combined into one dataset for mercury.

5. What is different about the samples reported between 7/7/2009 and

11/29/2011 and 11/6/2012 and 12/10/2013? Allegheny’s Chemical Lab analyzed all of the arsenic samples between 7/7/2009 and 11/29/2011, while FirstEnergy’s Beta Lab analyzed arsenic samples from 11/6/2011 through 12/10/2013. Decommissioning Hatfield's Ferry only accounts for data acquired after 10/6/2013. The last gene ration at Hatfield occurred on 10/6/2013, but in order to drain the FGD system all water was directed through the FGD

- WWTP and discharged via Internal Monitoring Point 306 (IMP

- 306). The samples from 11/6/2012 onwards do not have sample numbers. Was a d ifferent method or a different laboratory used? Allegheny and FirstEnergy used two different

versions of the same LIMS software. The switchover occurred in November 2012. The search to pull data from Allegheny ’s LIMS includes the Lab ID #, whereas, the search that pulls data from Beta ’s LIMS does not. Are these values in different units? For arsenic, the units are the same . Allegheny’s lab only ran 245.1 for mercury, as does Beta
Lab, so all of

the mercury samples were sent out to Geoche m ical Labs for 245.7

analysis. Again, the reason the 245.7 results are presented in two different columns (Columns E & F

– delete G) are because they were pulled from two different LIMS.

Thanks in advance for any advice you can offer,