The incineration of chemical weapons at the Pine Bluff Arsenal is on hold until May so piping in the facility’s pollution-abatement system can be replaced, officials said this week.

Piping made of fiberglass-reinforced plastic will be replaced with pipes made from a metallic alloy similar to stainless steel, according to an arsenal press release. The pipes carry a cleaning solution used in the system that cools and cleans exhaust gases from the incinerator furnaces.

Similar work has also been done at disposal sites in Umatilla, Ore., and Anniston, Ala.

“This piping just seems to be more durable,” said Raini Wright, a spokesman for the disposal facility. She said the pipe replacement at the Pine Bluff Arsenal was scheduled and will not prevent the arsenal from completing the incineration by its 2012 deadline.

The arsenal is one of eight sites where the nation stores its chemical weapons. The United States is working to destroy its national stockpile by 2012 to comply with an international treaty.

For decades, the weapons had been stored in underground igloos at the arsenal.

Since incineration began at the Pine Bluff Arsenal on March 29, 34,000 M55 rockets filled with GB nerve agent and almost 350,000 pounds of GB have been destroyed, according to the most recent tallies from the arsenal.

This story was published Saturday, January 14, 2006.