SHIPPINGPORT, Pa., June 25 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- FirstEnergy Generation Corp. said today that its clean up activities from the June 10, 2007, stack rain incident at the Bruce Mansfield Plant have been completed. Plant personnel have met with some 28 residents in portions of Shippingport Borough and Raccoon Township whose homes or cars were affected by the incident. In addition, the company cleaned Shippingport Borough Park immediately after the incident and the park was re-opened last week.
After a comprehensive investigation into the cause of the incident, the company determined a pollution control device known as a mist eliminator recently added to remove moisture from flue gas malfunctioned because deposits accumulated on the device. While periodic inspections of the mist eliminators were made, plant personnel have determined that, in the future, the equipment will be inspected during regular maintenance of the scrubber system so that any deposits can be removed.
Samples of the stack rain from June 10 were collected and laboratory testing shows it is non-hazardous. Since the incident occurred, plant personnel met with affected residents and recommended that they wash the material off their hands before eating and wash any food grown in their gardens.
FirstEnergy is a diversified energy company headquartered in Akron, Ohio. Its subsidiaries and affiliates are involved in the generation, transmission and distribution of electricity, as well as energy management and other energy-related services.
Forward-Looking Statements: This news release includes forward-looking statements based on information currently available to management. Such statements are subject to certain risks and uncertainties. These statements typically contain, but are not limited to, the terms "anticipate," "potential," "expect," "believe," "estimate" and similar words. Actual results may differ materially due to the speed and nature of increased competition and deregulation in the electric utility industry, economic or weather conditions affecting future sales and margins, changes in markets for energy services, changing energy and commodity market prices, replacement power costs being higher than anticipated or inadequately hedged, the continued ability of FirstEnergy's regulated utilities to collect transition and other charges or to recover increased transmission costs, maintenance costs being higher than anticipated, legislative and regulatory changes (including revised environmental requirements), and the legal and regulatory changes resulting from the implementation of the Energy Policy Act of 2005 (including, but not limited to, the repeal of the Public Utility Holding Company Act of 1935), the uncertainty of the timing and amounts of the capital expenditures needed to, among other things, implement the Air Quality Compliance Plan (including that such amounts could be higher than anticipated) or levels of emission reductions related to the Consent Decree resolving the New Source Review litigation, adverse regulatory or legal decisions and outcomes (including, but not limited to, the revocation of necessary licenses or operating permits and oversight) by the NRC (including, but not limited to, the Demand For Information issued to FENOC on May 14, 2007) and the various state public utility commissions as disclosed in our SEC filings, the timing and outcome of various proceedings before the PUCO (including, but not limited to, the Distribution Rate Cases for the Ohio Companies and the successful resolution of the issues remanded to the PUCO by the Ohio Supreme Court regarding the Rate Stabilization Plan) and the PPUC (including the transition rate plan filings for Met-Ed and Penelec and the Pennsylvania Power Company Default Service Plan filing), the continuing availability and operation of generating units, the ability of generating units to continue to operate at, or near full capacity, the inability to accomplish or realize anticipated benefits from strategic goals (including employee workforce initiatives), the anticipated benefits from voluntary pension plan contributions, the ability to improve electric commodity margins and to experience growth in the distribution business, the ability to access the public securities and other capital markets and the cost of such capital, the outcome, cost and other effects of present and potential legal and administrative proceedings and claims related to the August 14, 2003 regional power outage, the successful structuring and completion of a potential sale and leaseback transaction for Bruce Mansfield Unit 1 currently under consideration by management, any final adjustment in the purchase price per share under the accelerated share repurchase program announced March 2, 2007, the risks and other factors discussed from time to time in our SEC filings, and other similar factors. We expressly disclaim any current intention to update any forward-looking statements contained herein as a result of new information, future events, or otherwise.
