Birmingham News
August 9, 2003

Anniston incinerator already last of its breed

08/09/03
KATHERINE BOUMA
News staff writer

When the Army switches on the gas to its chemical weapons incinerator at Anniston Army Depot this morning, it already will be a relic of a passing era.
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All of the Army's future plans are for plants that will destroy chemical weapons by neutralization - mixing the deadly nerve and mustard gases with warm water or other nontoxic liquids, a process that involves no smokestacks or high heat.

When the Army laid plans for chemical weapons destruction in 1982, Anniston was No. 2 in line. Incinerator opponents accuse the Army of lockstepping toward incineration ever since, even as other sites have turned to lower-impact alternatives.

"The decision that selective incineration is the Army's preferred technology was made in 1982, which is a significant amount of time ago in terms of technology," said Craig Williams, director of the anti-burn coalition Chemical Weapons Working Group. "I would venture to say there are not a lot of things you use today that you used in 1982."

Back then, Army officials say, neutralization was not known to work. Even now, they say that incineration is more proven, after use at a test site and a long-running incinerator in Utah.

The state's environmental agency, state and federal judges and leaders of the community agreed that incineration remains the best choice for Anniston. And so opponents lost their final battle Friday when a judge refused to issue a restraining order against the Army.

Sarin rockets first:

Today, the Army intends to begin by incinerating two sarin gas-filled M55 rockets that have been stored at Anniston Army Depot since the beginning of the Cold War.

The incinerator will use two burners: one that is blast-resistant for rockets and explosives and one for liquid chemicals.

The work will slowly accelerate during a shakedown period of 720 hours of operation.

During the next weeks and months, operations will slowly ramp up to full speed until the incinerator enters a series of trial burn periods, with the state testing emissions to be certain they meet air permit guidelines. If the incinerator can pass that test, it ultimately will destroy 42,762 rockets before shutting down to retool and begin again with another type of weapon.

Over the next decade, the Army expects to destroy 661,529 artillery projectiles, rockets and mines now stored in earth-covered bunkers at the Anniston depot. Eventually, it is expected to bring a third incinerator, a metal parts furnace, online for destruction of nonexplosive parts.

The destruction is expected to cost about $2.3 billion, not including closing down the incinerator after its final burn.

Early opposition:

Opposition to the plan formed almost immediately after the 1990 announcement of the incinerator. But in a community of 70,000 people, the Families Concerned About Nerve Gas Incineration group has considered its events a success when out-of-town activists have swelled its ranks to 350.

Organizers say the incinerator has never been considered much more than a curiosity by most of the population.

Sherri Sumners, president of the Calhoun County Chamber of Commerce, dismisses opponents as a few people who enjoy grabbing headlines. Most residents are "solidly behind it, and have been since the beginning," she said.

"The stockpile is the problem, the incinerator is the solution," she said. "Really, that is the feeling of the vast majority of the community."

Members of Families Concerned About Nerve Gas Incineration don't agree the community is gung-ho to burn the stockpile. But they won't argue that there is widespread lack of concern about the incinerator, which they attribute to apathy and having other concerns.

They swap tales of Anniston residents who don't know their evacuation routes or can't remember where they put their government-issue emergency alert radios.

"I think they're using all the energy they can just to get through the day," said Brenda Lindell, a member of the group. "All of us are walking wounded."

Anniston is a city that has pinballed from one crisis to another during the past decade.

Stench of failure:

The discovery of widespread PCB pollution in the early 1990s revealed that one of Anniston's long-established companies had poisoned miles of water and land, hundreds of residences and people. By the time lead was discovered to have contaminated the area, the stench of failure was so great that a national publication dubbed the Calhoun County city "Toxic Town."

A few years later, the Army closed Fort McClellan, one of the area's largest employers, and the city's already large core of depressed housing sank lower in value. The Anniston Army Depot now is being discussed as a candidate for base closing when a new round begins in 2005.

So although Anniston is envied by no one this morning, today's events may seem the least of the community's concerns.

Craig Williams of the anti-burn coalition called Chemical Weapons Working Group also points out that the community is more tightly enmeshed with the military than the communities where incinerator proposals have been defeated.

With two Army bases in the vicinity, the small city is saturated with people whose livelihoods have depended on the military. Others have long been accustomed to toting gas masks on their hips, suiting up to check on chemical weapons or submitting to blood tests to check their background levels for toxic exposure.

"That sort of situation where you have a strong tie to the military lends itself to less engagement, less challenging, less controversy around decisions that are made by the military," Williams said.

The community mentality is more likely to be that, "because of my allegiance I'm not going to raise my hand, or because of my patriotic feelings I'm not going to raise my hand," Williams said. "If they say they want to burn them, must be OK. If they say they want to dump it in the creek, fine. If they want to throw it on my kid's breakfast cereal, fine."

Strained relationship:

The military's relationship with Anniston is particularly fraught now because of fears that the remaining base will pull out of the city in two years.

In some of the states that pushed aggressively against the incineration plans, the weapon stockpiles sit alone in now-closed depots that have almost no economic impact. Anniston estimates its depot contributes $1 billion to the economy.

Already scarred by Fort McClellan's closure, city leaders openly warn that if they don't cooperate with incineration plans, the depot could appear on the Base Realignment and Closure Commission list.

"In a perfect world the two are not related, but there are perceptions of support," said chamber president Sumners. "We need to be sure it's very clear that this community is very supportive of the military presence here."

She said her business coalition has backed incineration since the beginning and believes that support could make the difference for keeping the depot and its 4,700 jobs.

She said she also favors incineration because she is not afraid of it. And she said her views are reflected by most of the community.

She points out that fewer than half of the residents who qualify have bothered to get the training and collect their protective hoods, the gas-mask-like equipment offered to residents closest to the incinerator.

"We have been inundated with information, so, yes, I think that shows confidence," Sumners said.

Workers on base are confident also, said employee union President Everett Kelley, even though most of them are not provided masks or hoods. After years of working near the stockpile, they see no reason to worry now, he said.

"We feel pretty secure and safe out here," Kelley said. "It's not necessarily an issue for our employees. We come out here every day."

Even at the local activist group Community Against Pollution, leaders are not arguing for neutralization instead of incineration. They worry that would only slow destruction of the stockpile.

"We are tired of living with this every day," said David Baker, executive director of the group that devotes itself primarily to PCB pollution.

Other option:

At four other depots, where incineration was opposed more stridently, the Army decided to destroy chemical weapons by neutralizing the nerve agents.

The techniques are more low-key and simpler than incineration. Mustard gas, for instance, is neutralized with hot water. The resulting waste is treated with hydrochloric acid and ordinary bacteria taken from a sewage plant.

That low-tech approach has been adopted for stockpiles in Colorado, Maryland, Kentucky and Indiana.

Without enormously high temperatures and smokestacks allowing exit to the outside world, technicians have more control over the lethal chemicals, Williams said. However, Army officials point to low-level releases of vapor within the plant during a pilot project in Maryland that have forced the Army to close the plant.

"Incineration does work," Army spokesman Mike Abrams said. "We can't argue the fact that we have incinerated 16 million pounds successfully on Johnston Atoll and out in Utah."

A change to neutralization would set the Anniston process back 15 to 20 years, he said.

"We have a plant. We have the procedures, and we have a trained workforce, and for us to change now, besides working with ADEM for a new permit, we would have to go back to Congress to ask for hundreds of millions of dollars to fund it," he said. "I think it would be foolish for us to do that."

Incineration opponents argue that Abrams' statement is impossible to verify or refute.

Williams said the Army has refused to provide information and did not do its own analysis of the cost of retrofitting the Anniston plant as a neutralization site. He said his best guess, assisted by experts, is that it would cost about $150 million and allow the job to be completed more quickly.

Abrams said incineration should begin soon because the weapons are leaking inside their earthen bunkers. In the 1990s, several hundred leaks of nerve agents and mustard gas occurred at U.S. chemical depots, according to a 2002 National Academy of Sciences report. The scientists concluded that incinerating the weapons is 230 times safer than storing them.

Risks considered:

However, the Academy of Sciences did not find that incinerators are without risks.

The academy found that the first two incinerators, on a Pacific atoll and in Utah, experienced at least 40 serious incidents over 12 years. In a few instances, workers were injured.

In three documented events, chemical agent survived the incineration process and at least a few drops' worth were released into the environment. The Utah plant has been shut down for several months at a time after several serious accidents.

On Johnston Atoll, a worker was burned on the leg by mustard gas while carrying a bag of hazardous waste inside the plant. In no case did a worker die of chemical exposure, although two have been killed in unrelated accidents.

Last summer, one employee at the Army's Utah incinerator was shown to have been exposed to the deadly nerve gas sarin. Army officials say he was not injured.

But Baker, who lives in the high-risk zone near the incinerator, said he and others in the community believe burning the weapons is the best of a series of bad options. And they agree with the Army that it's time to just do something about the stockpile.

"I don't know if I'm right," Baker said. "I don't know if they're right, but we could be dead right.