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Emergency Remediation - 2480 Tracy Blvd., Tracy, CA. • Page 9 <br /> below the water table. However, there is a trend in the data that suggests that the <br /> concentrations of gasoline decrease rapidly with depth below the water table. <br /> The observed distribution of contaminants in the soil is typical of sites down gradient <br /> from a leaking, underground, fuel storage tank, where the leaked fuel floats on the water <br /> table beneath the tank and is carried down gradient under the action of groundwater flow. <br /> The floating layer of fuel, as it advances with its associated plume of dissolved <br /> hydrocarbon compounds, is smeared over, and adsorbed onto, the soil closely above and <br /> below the water table. The thickness of the zone thus affected by high concentrations of <br /> hydrocarbons increases as the water table rises and falls seasonally. <br /> MTBE was first used as an additive to gasoline in California in the winter of 1992. Thus, <br /> its presence in the soils and groundwater beneath the 2480 Tracy Boulevard property <br /> indicates that the source of discharge to the groundwater that has contaminated the site <br /> was on going at least up until that time. <br /> ' Figure 3 is a cross section through the basement structure of the new car-wash and <br /> lubrication-service facility that illustrates the relationship between: the soil sampling <br /> locations, the basement excavation, the basement slab, the water table, the property <br /> boundaries and the zone of the subsurface found to be affected by gasoline. (Note: As <br /> shown on Figure 2, Section A-A! on Figure 3 passes through push-probe sampling <br /> location PP-6. Other nearby sampling locations that have been projected into the section <br /> are indicated by dashed lines.) <br /> Based on in-situ permeability testing of similar soils in other locations in the region, it is <br /> estimated that the silty clay has a hydraulic conductivity around 2.0 x 10-3 cm/sec. If it is <br /> also assumed that the gradient of the water table is around 0.002 ft/ft to 0.003 ft/, which is <br /> typically found in and around Tracy at sites with similar hydrogeologic settings, and that <br /> the porosity of the soil is 0.5, then a reasonable estimate of the rate of down-gradient <br /> groundwater flow is 0.04 ft/day. <br /> The above estimate for the down-gradient flow rate, combined with the known date when <br /> MTBE was first added to gasoline in California, places the source of the gasoline affecting <br /> the subsurface beneath the 2480 Tracy Boulevard property no more than 48 ft. up the <br /> groundwater gradient from the basement excavation. If a significantly more conservative <br /> estimate of 1.0 x 10-2 cm/sec for the hydraulic conductivity of the silty clays is used, the <br /> isource of the gasoline found under the 2480 Tracy Boulevard site is projected to be no <br /> more than 103 ft. up gradient of the basement excavation. Both of those estimated <br /> distances place the source of contamination well within the boundaries of the 575 West <br /> Grant Line Road property. <br /> REMEDIATION OF SOIL AND GROUNDWATER <br /> Mr. Sanchez contracted with Dietz Irrigation of Tracy, California, an experienced <br /> remediation contractor holding a Class A General Engineering License with a Hazardous- <br />