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The View From Maybelot

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Maybenaut
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Re: The View From Maybelot

#151

Post by Maybenaut »

It never ends here at Maybelot...

We have an oil furnace which we planned on replacing in the next year or so with an electric furnace. We have solar (or will have, as soon as the electric company comes and installs the net meter - the solar panels and inverters are already here). Figuring to get one more winter out of the oil furnace we filled the tank, but then we had all those problems that caused our house to fill up with smoke. It happened again even after we plugged all those holes, so we had a furnace guy come out and look at it. He was saying the furnace was starved for fuel. How can that be? We just had the tank filled up.

Turns out, the oil tank leaked. 500 gallons of heating oil ($1500 worth :mad: ) went into the ground. We immediately called the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality, and they helped us out in a big way. They have a fund for this sort of thing. We pay the first $500 of the cost of remediation, and the state pays the rest (this is one of the things your gas tax covers). They hooked us up with a contractor who came right out, checked what we have, and developed a remediation plan. Fortunately because we're out in the middle of BFE and there is very little risk that the oil is going to enter the water supply, they're not going to have to dig up our yard (they don't think). They are going to sink a monitoring well under the asphalt which will be covered by a manhole, and they're going to foam in the tank rather than remove it. That foaming-in will also be on our dime, but it's not too terribly expensive. From what I understand, the State pays to remediate the spill, but doesn't put you back to where you were. If they had to pull the tank, they'd have to dig out a bunch of concrete, and we would have to pay to replace it, which would be much more than the cost of foaming it in.

So now we're getting an electric furnace, which is what we wanted. We're just getting it sooner. But we have a very nice wood stove and a heat pump that keep enough of the house warm.
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Re: The View From Maybelot

#152

Post by AndyinPA »

Yikes! I'm glad it's working out okay for you, though.
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Re: The View From Maybelot

#153

Post by Volkonski »

AndyinPA wrote: Mon Nov 29, 2021 6:52 pm Yikes! I'm glad it's working out okay for you, though.
:yeahthat: :thumbsup:
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Re: The View From Maybelot

#154

Post by Gene Kooper »

Maybenaut wrote: Mon Nov 29, 2021 6:44 pm It never ends here at Maybelot...

Turns out, the oil tank leaked. 500 gallons of heating oil ($1500 worth :mad: ) went into the ground. We immediately called the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality, and they helped us out in a big way. They have a fund for this sort of thing. We pay the first $500 of the cost of remediation, and the state pays the rest (this is one of the things your gas tax covers). They hooked us up with a contractor who came right out, checked what we have, and developed a remediation plan. Fortunately because we're out in the middle of BFE and there is very little risk that the oil is going to enter the water supply, they're not going to have to dig up our yard (they don't think). They are going to sink a monitoring well under the asphalt which will be covered by a manhole, and they're going to foam in the tank rather than remove it. That foaming-in will also be on our dime, but it's not too terribly expensive. From what I understand, the State pays to remediate the spill, but doesn't put you back to where you were. If they had to pull the tank, they'd have to dig out a bunch of concrete, and we would have to pay to replace it, which would be much more than the cost of foaming it in.
Being The Fogbow's resident hydrogeologist (by default), I am very hesitant that you should assume YOUR drinking water supply is not being adversely affected by the fuel oil spill, esp. regarding the lighter fraction hydrocarbons. It may very well be that you caught the problem early enough to not have contaminants migrate from the initial spill area to your drinking water supply. If you are remote, it may be that this will not have an adverse affect on groundwater quality in the neighborhood. However, the fuel oil tank may have been compromised well before you purchased the property.

Since I am not familiar with the layout of your property (and whether you are on well water), I recommend getting another professional opinion (not to mention a careful evaluation of your contractor). Have your drinking water supply tested from your tap and send the samples to a local environmental lab. In my opinion, as the property owners you have a responsibility to mitigate any possible pollution to the groundwater (I'm sure you know that).

Good Luck!
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Re: The View From Maybelot

#155

Post by Maybenaut »

Mr. Gneiss wrote: Mon Nov 29, 2021 9:27 pm
Maybenaut wrote: Mon Nov 29, 2021 6:44 pm It never ends here at Maybelot...

Turns out, the oil tank leaked. 500 gallons of heating oil ($1500 worth :mad: ) went into the ground. We immediately called the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality, and they helped us out in a big way. They have a fund for this sort of thing. We pay the first $500 of the cost of remediation, and the state pays the rest (this is one of the things your gas tax covers). They hooked us up with a contractor who came right out, checked what we have, and developed a remediation plan. Fortunately because we're out in the middle of BFE and there is very little risk that the oil is going to enter the water supply, they're not going to have to dig up our yard (they don't think). They are going to sink a monitoring well under the asphalt which will be covered by a manhole, and they're going to foam in the tank rather than remove it. That foaming-in will also be on our dime, but it's not too terribly expensive. From what I understand, the State pays to remediate the spill, but doesn't put you back to where you were. If they had to pull the tank, they'd have to dig out a bunch of concrete, and we would have to pay to replace it, which would be much more than the cost of foaming it in.
Being The Fogbow's resident hydrogeologist (by default), I am very hesitant that you should assume YOUR drinking water supply is not being adversely affected by the fuel oil spill, esp. regarding the lighter fraction hydrocarbons. It may very well be that you caught the problem early enough to not have contaminants migrate from the initial spill area to your drinking water supply. If you are remote, it may be that this will not have an adverse affect on groundwater quality in the neighborhood. However, the fuel oil tank may have been compromised well before you purchased the property.

Since I am not familiar with the layout of your property (and whether you are on well water), I recommend getting another professional opinion (not to mention a careful evaluation of your contractor). Have your drinking water supply tested from your tap and send the samples to a local environmental lab. In my opinion, as the property owners you have a responsibility to mitigate any possible pollution to the groundwater (I'm sure you know that).

Good Luck!
Yes, we do know that. That’s all part of the remediation plan. We have a good friend who is a soils engineer (he does drain fields); he told us the contractor the state recommended is the same one he would have chosen, so I feel pretty confident about them.

We are on well water. The well is at least 150’ away and up slope from the tank (I know that doesn’t necessarily mean anything). The contractor told us that while they don’t *think* there will be any problem with our water, they’re still going to test it (I think the State guy said that was required).

And they have to figure out where the oil went. We’re on the side of a mountain, on a fairly steep slope, although it’s terraced in spots. As I understand it, it’s pretty much solid rock (limestone and sandstone). We own the property down-slope.

The oil tank is buried below concrete and asphalt in front of the house. On the back side of the tank is the cinder block wall to our basement (it hasn’t seeped through, at least not yet, anyway). They’re going to drill in front of the tank, and a few other places on the property to see if they can find it.

They said if they don’t find it right away but it turns up somewhere else six months or a year from now or whatever, they’ll reopen the case and do the remediation.

I’m pretty sure we’re doing all that we can.
"Hey! We left this England place because it was bogus, and if we don't get some cool rules ourselves, pronto, we'll just be bogus too!" -- Thomas Jefferson
Gene Kooper
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Re: The View From Maybelot

#156

Post by Gene Kooper »

Please don't take my comments as being negative or overbearing; their intent is purely educational. In my experience, an uncontrolled release of hydrocarbons is never a good thing. I look at uncontrolled chemical spills as being similar to opening Pandora's box. You can never get the "evil" completely back in the box.

I did my graduate research on domestic water wells in the fractured-crystalline rocks in the Foothills west of Denver. The main purpose of my research was to determine what topographic and geologic parameters most influence water well yields. Often it is necessary to frack the water well, esp. when the water-bearing formation is tight. Looking at the surface topography, it may seem that there can be no hydraulic connection between the spot where the spill occurred and your domestic water well.

Unfortunately, that is not always the case. For example, pumping water from the well lowers the water table near the well. Especially when the geologic formation is a low water producer, the depressing of the water table near the well from pumping can create a gradient from the "downhill" contaminant source to the water well. In other words, the fuel oil percolates down to the water table and because of its areal position relative to the cone of depression caused by your pumping well, components of the fuel oil can end up at your tap.

Here is a graphic and web link by the U.S. Geological Survey that illustrates my point.
USGS_cone_of_depression.png
USGS_cone_of_depression.png (286.69 KiB) Viewed 2106 times
Cone of depression: Pumping a well can cause water level lowering

Edits for readability.
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Maybenaut
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Re: The View From Maybelot

#157

Post by Maybenaut »

I didn’t take your comments as anything but helpful! I really do appreciate your insight!

We’ll get a report from the engineers; I’m happy to share it with you if you want to see it.

:bighug:
"Hey! We left this England place because it was bogus, and if we don't get some cool rules ourselves, pronto, we'll just be bogus too!" -- Thomas Jefferson
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Re: The View From Maybelot

#158

Post by Gene Kooper »

Maybenaut wrote: Tue Nov 30, 2021 1:21 am I didn’t take your comments as anything but helpful! I really do appreciate your insight!

We’ll get a report from the engineers; I’m happy to share it with you if you want to see it.

:bighug:
Thanks, Maybenaut. My reason for posting is not to shoehorn my way into your problem. If you have questions or want to hear a :oldman: 's impressions of what happened and the remediation efforts by the contractor and State, I'll be glad to look at the engineer's report. As an intellectual curiosity, I am interested in what type of remedial action(s) will be used. My experience is more with old leaky tanks at gasoline stations where benzene, toluene and xylene are the nasty fraction of the gasoline that most impact the groundwater quality. For instance, benzene is listed by the EPA as a known human carcinogen (causes leukemia). Cleanup efforts for these "yank-a-tank" remedial projects often include injection of hydrocarbon-loving bacteria "downstream" from the spill. The bacteria are mixed with water and fertilizers and injected in the ground down-gradient from the leaky tank. The fertilizer creates a biologic bloom and after the fertilizer is eaten the only things left on the menu for the bacteria are the gasoline components.

As an aside, I am surprised that the fuel oil tank apparently failed catastrophically so soon after your purchase of Maybelot. That is a main reason for my concern; the likelihood that the problem didn't start with the uncontrolled release of of the 500 gallons of fuel oil that you and your husband recently purchased. The tank may have released fuel oil over a much longer time period before it finally got noticed.
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Re: The View From Maybelot

#159

Post by Maybenaut »

Mr. Gneiss wrote: Tue Nov 30, 2021 1:51 pm
Maybenaut wrote: Tue Nov 30, 2021 1:21 am I didn’t take your comments as anything but helpful! I really do appreciate your insight!

We’ll get a report from the engineers; I’m happy to share it with you if you want to see it.

:bighug:
Thanks, Maybenaut. My reason for posting is not to shoehorn my way into your problem. If you have questions or want to hear a :oldman: 's impressions of what happened and the remediation efforts by the contractor and State, I'll be glad to look at the engineer's report. As an intellectual curiosity, I am interested in what type of remedial action(s) will be used. My experience is more with old leaky tanks at gasoline stations where benzene, toluene and xylene are the nasty fraction of the gasoline that most impact the groundwater quality. For instance, benzene is listed by the EPA as a known human carcinogen (causes leukemia). Cleanup efforts for these "yank-a-tank" remedial projects often include injection of hydrocarbon-loving bacteria "downstream" from the spill. The bacteria are mixed with water and fertilizers and injected in the ground down-gradient from the leaky tank. The fertilizer creates a biologic bloom and after the fertilizer is eaten the only things left on the menu for the bacteria are the gasoline components.

As an aside, I am surprised that the fuel oil tank apparently failed catastrophically so soon after your purchase of Maybelot. That is a main reason for my concern; the likelihood that the problem didn't start with the uncontrolled release of of the 500 gallons of fuel oil that you and your husband recently purchased. The tank may have released fuel oil over a much longer time period before it finally got noticed.
That’s certainly possible. The oil company told me the previous owners only bought a hundred or so gallons at a time, but that doesn’t surprise me because they didn’t have a lot of money, and told us they only used the furnace to heat the A-coil for the heat pump.

The tank was nearly empty when we bought the place in March. We put 300 gallons in to get us through the last of the cold weather. There was still about 200 gallons in the tank before we topped it off on 11/11. We put another 250 gallons in and noticed yesterday the tank was nearly empty (about 4” still in the bottom). So it’s possible that the additional weight caused it to break.

I think it’s possible that the oil is still very close to the tank. I think (but don’t know for sure) that the tank is inside a concrete chamber, and the oil (or a lot of it) might still be trapped in there. But we don’t know and they’re going to check.

Here’s what that looks like. The orifice for adding the fuel oil is hard to see, but it’s in the middle of that pebbly sidewalk.
EBD52D5A-E55C-4592-AAA1-5CF8F72E3176.jpeg
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Re: The View From Maybelot

#160

Post by Gene Kooper »

I'll keep my fingers crossed with you, Maybenaut. :smoking:
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Re: The View From Maybelot

#161

Post by Maybenaut »

Mr. Gneiss wrote: Tue Nov 30, 2021 3:13 pm I'll keep my fingers crossed with you, Maybenaut. :smoking:
Thanks! Whatever they do has to be approved by the state, and I’m confident that people who know much more about all of this than I do have it well in hand. I’ll keep you posted on the progress. :bighug:
"Hey! We left this England place because it was bogus, and if we don't get some cool rules ourselves, pronto, we'll just be bogus too!" -- Thomas Jefferson
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Re: The View From Maybelot

#162

Post by RVInit »

Wow, that is really something. That is a huge amount of oil. I hope your water is not contaminated, it sure doesn't sound like you need that additional problem. I'm so glad you don't have to foot the bill for the whole cleanup, though. Still, this is a big hassle for you, I'm sure.

:bighug:
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Re: The View From Maybelot

#163

Post by Maybenaut »

We’re now generating our own electricity here at Maybelot!
D4707EB7-EC18-4D66-A5AE-BD91470F41AB.jpeg
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Re: The View From Maybelot

#164

Post by raison de arizona »

Nice!
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Re: The View From Maybelot

#165

Post by Volkonski »

:thumbsup:
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Re: The View From Maybelot

#166

Post by AndyinPA »

:clap:
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Re: The View From Maybelot

#167

Post by Whatever4 »

Is this the biggest building in the county? :shock:
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Re: The View From Maybelot

#168

Post by Maybenaut »

Whatever4 wrote: Tue Dec 14, 2021 12:01 pm Is this the biggest building in the county? :shock:
It’s 5000 sq feet, so no, there are bigger buildings. It’s just long and skinny.
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Re: The View From Maybelot

#169

Post by Tiredretiredlawyer »

You should name it Maybelot Solar Energy Supply. Fogbow members can be charter members. I am open to other names and especially anagrams and acronyms.
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Re: The View From Maybelot

#170

Post by Foggy »

I'm just happy that Maybeseaux doesn't have to spend a lot of time mowing the back yard. :biggrin:
Out from under. :thumbsup:
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Re: The View From Maybelot

#171

Post by bill_g »

Raise some cattle and you can call it Maybelot Meat and Light.
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Re: The View From Maybelot

#172

Post by AndyinPA »

:rotflmao:

My kind of backyard!
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Re: The View From Maybelot

#173

Post by neonzx »

Do you get a kick-back reverse feeding into the energy grid --?

That's a big building. You even have like commercial parking. Heck, do you bring in house keepers? I can't even keep my own place clean.
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Re: The View From Maybelot

#174

Post by Maybenaut »

neonzx wrote: Tue Dec 14, 2021 2:22 pm Do you get a kick-back reverse feeding into the energy grid --?

The energy goes through our panel. Any power in excess of our current use goes to the grid. When we’re not making enough. we pull from the grid. A net meter measures the difference. We get a bill at the end of the month. We pay a fee to be connected to the grid, plus pay for any electricity they had to supply to us. For months where we generate more than we use, we get credit, which always accrue and never expire (but we won’t ever get cash; when we sell, the new owner starts over again, even if we have credit accrued). We’ll make more in the summer than we use, and less in the winter. But it should balance out. The electric company will only approve a system capable of generating 110% of anticipated use.

Also, our generating capacity (as opposed to actual power generated) is a commodity that can be sold on the open market. Energy companies are required to certify that a certain percentage of their power comes from renewable sources. But many energy companies don’t actually produce electricity, or if they do, it’s not from green sources. So they bid to purchase your generating capacity so they can include it in their certification. The solar company manages all of that, they skim off the top, and we’ll get a check every year (not a ton of money between $500 and $1K, but better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick).


That's a big building. You even have like commercial parking.

It originally was a gift shop. Then a B and B. We’ve thought about pulling up the parking lot, but it’s nice for those times when we have a lot of people here. The only down side is that people pull in looking for a place to nap. It doesn’t bother me if they want to take pictures of the view, as long as they don’t stay too long. What I really hate, though, is sometime a car will screech into the lot and someone will hop out and barf on the pavement (we’re on a pretty windy, vomit-inducing road for those prone to carsickness)

Heck, do you bring in house keepers? I can't even keep my own place clean.

I don’t bring in a housekeeper. We mainly stick to the back half of the ground floor. It’s not too much to keep up with.
"Hey! We left this England place because it was bogus, and if we don't get some cool rules ourselves, pronto, we'll just be bogus too!" -- Thomas Jefferson
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Re: The View From Maybelot

#175

Post by Maybenaut »

bill_g wrote: Tue Dec 14, 2021 1:51 pm Raise some cattle and you can call it Maybelot Meat and Light.
It would have to be goats. The hill behind the house is nearly vertical.

We do provide our own utilities, though. We have a well with a water treatment system; a sewage treatment plant in the form of an alternative septic system; and now electricity. So, Maybelot Department of Private Works?
"Hey! We left this England place because it was bogus, and if we don't get some cool rules ourselves, pronto, we'll just be bogus too!" -- Thomas Jefferson
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