Aquarian Analytical, Inc.  

                      STANDARD OPERATING PROCEDURES FOR METHANOL PRESERVATION

                                                                              METHOD 5035

                                                        Aquarian Lab Preparation Procedure:

1.      5 ml of Purge and Trap Grade Methanol is added to 20 ml vial  2   The vial containing the Methanol is weighed to 0.0001g on an analytical balance.    The total weight of the vial and Methanol is recorded in a lab notebook

3.   The preweighed vial along with the soil jar and 10 ml soil syringe is delivered to the field sampler.

                                                                Field Sampling Procedures:

1.   The plunger tab on the soil syringe should be placed in the position where its notch is placed within the indentation on the soil syringe handle.  The end of the soil syringe is placed and twisted in to the sample location to create a plug of tightly packed soil.  This plug represents approximately 5 grams of soil.

2.   The plug is then injected into the methanol vial by turning the notch in the handle and slowly pushed downward to push out and inject the plug into the 20 ml Methanol vial without causing any of the Methanol to splash out due to overdue force.  The vial is immediately recapped snugly so that no Methanol can evaporate or escape easily.  The Methanol must be completely covering the soil.  If it is not, the sample must be retaken.

3.   A soil sample from this same sample location should also be collected in the soil jar provided to allow AQUARIAN to perform other analyses as well as to determine the percent solid content.

4.  The filled sample containers need to be placed immediately in a sample cooler with ice and maintained at 2 to 6 degrees Celcius.

5.   Please be advised that it costs Aquarian approximately $5.00 to prepare each soil setup.  Therefore, to cover our costs, AQUARIAN reserves the right to charge for 5035 vials that are not returned, or if unnecessary duplicates are taken.