Material is scheduled for disposal in Salem County
By LAWRENCE HAJNA
Courier-Post Staff
CARNEYS POINT
U.S. Rep. Rob Andrews is demanding the Army release results of tests of the VX nerve agent destruction process performed at a stockpile in Indiana, saying the public has a right to know every detail of the plan to ship the resulting waste product to DuPont for final treatment.
"It's a critical piece of information that is not being made available to the public," Andrews, D-Haddon Heights, said in a telephone conference call Wednesday.
"A pin-size drop can kill a person," he said. "A tiny, tiny portion of VX nerve agent can kill a person, so the question of how much will remain after destruction is crucial to human health."
Tests over the summer showed a portion of the VX that would be neutralized at the Army's Newport Chemical Depot in west-central Indiana would exceed a 20-parts-per-billion safety threshold.
But the Army stressed it will not send any neutralized VX waste product to DuPont unless it meets or is less than that standard.
A formal report will be released to the public and Andrews when it's finalized, likely before winter, said Jeff Lindblad, spokesman for the Army's Chemical Materials Agency.
"When we complete the report, we will share that. The analysis is still ongoing," Lindblad said.
The Army is trying to destroy its Cold War-era chemical weapons stockpile,
now banned by international treaty. It plans to use a solution of sodium hydroxide
and hot water to break down VX, one of the deadliest chemicals ever made,
into a caustic chemical known as hydrolysate.
DuPont has proposed treating up to 4 million gallons of hydrolysate, likened to household drain cleaner, and discharging the resulting wastewater to the Delaware River.
Tests conducted over the summer at the Newport depot used water to simulate VX. Those tests indicated "challenges" reaching destruction targets for 54 percent of the stockpile, Lindblad said.
The difficulty results from a stabilizer or combination of two stabilizers added to prevent degradation of VX when it was manufactured in the 1960s, Lindblad said. Lindblad, however, did not know by how much the tests exceeded the 20-parts-per-billion target.
The remainder of the stockpile, which contains a different stabilizer, can be brought to the standard in 2 1/2 hours, Lindblad said.
The plan to ship VX hydrolysate to DuPont triggered a storm of opposition among South Jersey residents, who fear that trucks carrying hydrolysate could become terrorist targets and that VX could slip through the neutralization process.
Andrews remains skeptical, arguing the Army has repeatedly been less than forthcoming about developments in the plan. He argued it has taken aggressive media reporting for the Army to make key disclosures.
"It has really been an opaque process when it should be a transparent one," he said, adding opposition to transporting the material is building in Indiana and Pennsylvania.
The plan is on hold pending health and ecological reviews by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Environmental Protection Agency, which Andrews requested.
The Army would like to begin treating and shipping the portion of the neutralized stockpile that has not had stabilizer problems to DuPont after the completion of the reviews, Lindblad said.
"It's going to be slow, deliberate and methodical," Lindblad said. "It's a pilot facility and we realize things can arise and we will address them."
But Andrews argued the hydrolysate should be treated at the chemical depot. New Jersey Gov. James E. McGreevey and Delaware Gov. Ruth Ann Minner oppose the DuPont plan. New Jersey officials say DuPont needs major environmental permit modifications to proceed with the plan.
Reach Lawrence Hajna at (856) 486-2466 or lhajna@courierpostonline.com