Birmingham News
August 1, 2003

Incinerator to be fired up

08/01/03
KATHERINE BOUMA
News staff writer

The Pentagon decided Thursday to leave behind months of negotiations and begin burning chemical weapons at its incinerator in Anniston next week.

A shakedown period, of slowly burning M55 rockets filled with the nerve gas sarin, will begin Wednesday and continue for weeks until the incinerator has operated for 720 hours.

After that, the state and Army will move on to a trial burn period, when the incinerator will operate at a more regular speed and emissions will be tested by the state.

However, before the Army even announced its decision, opponents announced plans to block the opening.

The 745 workers at the Anniston Chemical Agent Disposal Facility have been prepared for months and are eager to begin work, said Mike Abrams, a spokesman for the Army.

"We honestly believe that we have a noble mission and we will do the work safely," he said. "When all is said and done the weapons will be gone, the environment will be no worse for the effort, and the risk to this area due to chemical weapons storage will be gone."

The Chemical Weapons Working Group and local environmental groups say their attorney is negotiating with Department of Justice attorneys to delay the start-up until a judge in Washington can hear their request for a preliminary injunction.

The lawsuit argues that the Army should have considered neutralizing the weapons without incineration, under a federal environmental law that requires alternatives be examined. Craig Williams, executive director of the anti-burn group, said he is outraged that the Army has agreed to move forward before a plan is worked out for the emergency needs of the special needs people in the at-risk zone around the incinerator.

"They are backsliding on their commitments to the citizens of that community and the most needy citizens of that community," said Craig Williams. "It's a slap in the face, and they should be held accountable."

Abrams said the Army paid for protective measures for citizens around the incinerator, but responsibility for all the safety work off-base was left to the state and federal emergency management agencies.

Anniston Army Depot is one of eight sites where the United States is destroying nerve gas weapons that have been in storage since the Cold War. Over the next decade, the Army expects to destroy 661,529 artillery shells, rockets and mines now stored in earthen bunkers there. The operation is expected to cost about $2.3 billion.

In 1982, when plans were laid to place Anniston third in the lineup for chemical weapon destruction, Army officials say they believed weapons could be destroyed only with the intense heat of incineration.

Now, the last four sites to come on-line are expected to function without heat or smokestacks, neutralizing the chemicals with warm water or other non-toxic liquids.

The Alabama Department of Environmental Management sent engineers to Anniston on Sunday, three days before issuing the permit. They will stay there 24 hours a day for the near future to observe and ensure that the Army meets the requirements of federal environmental laws, a spokesman said. The Army also has placed hundreds of air monitors throughout the incinerator and the base.

Until late last week, the Army and Gov. Bob Riley had been negotiating the terms of the incinerator's start-up. The two sides reached an impasse and now officials say they will move forward without the governor's approval.

However, the Army said it will live up to the terms of its offer to Riley, such as operating during hours when children are not in school until the schools are pressurized in October.

Abrams said the Army could have begun operations immediately after receiving a permit from the state Wednesday, but leaders wanted to plan a series of briefings for the public to describe how incinerator workers will safely destroy the chemical weapons.

The first meetings will be Monday at 5 p.m. and 7 p.m. and Tuesday at 5 p.m. and 7 p.m. in the Anniston Community Outreach Office, at 11 East Tenth Street.