Even though most chemicalfilled munitions fed into the incinerator at the Pine Bluff Chemical Agent Disposal Facility will be obliterated, there will be some toxic leftovers that must be disposed of.
   
In addition to vast quantities of ash, the U.S. Army’s contractor must get rid of brine generated from the pollution-control system attached to the incinerator’s stacks.
   
And, in coming weeks, the Army’s contractor at the arsenal, the Washington Group International, must decide where to send truckloads of waste generated once the incinerator is fired up early next year.
   
It is likely that the hazardous waste produced at the Pine Bluff Arsenal won’t stay in Arkansas since there’s no commercial landfill or deep-injection well licensed to handle it, state environmental regulators say.
   
The Washington Group’s current waste disposal contract is with a Texas-based company, but that deal is being renegotiated.
   
Members of the Chemical Weapons Working Group, a Kentucky-based citizen activist group opposed to incinerating weapons, say they worry that the waste generated at the chemical destruction facilities will be disposed of in poor communities.
   
They concede, however, that they’ve had a difficult time keeping track of where the waste generated at Anniston, Ala.; Tooele, Utah; and Hermiston, Ore. — the three operational chemical destruction plants — is being deposited.
   
Officials with the Chemical Materials Agency, which oversees the national chemical weapons disposal program, say the waste frequently is scrapped in the state where it’s produced.
   
But ultimately, the decision where to send it is based on economics.
   
At Tooele, and also at Anniston, they’ve looked at the cost per gallon of sending it to different places, said Amy Dean, an environmental engineer for the agency. "How far away are they? What is the facility’s environmental compliance history? All those factor into where they’re going to send it. And at any point in time depending upon if a factor changes, it could go somewhere else."
   
In addition to incinerator ash and brine, there’s the endless stream of contaminated worker protective suits, rags, masks — known as secondary or "legacy" waste.
   
At the Pine Bluff site, the Washington Group plans to simultaneously destroy secondary waste and weapons, eliminating the possibility of a massive trash buildup.
   
"We’ve got a real good mix of munitions that allows us to do this," said Randy Long, project manager at Pine Bluff.