Local
Posted on Wed, May
09, 2007
Suit seeks to prevent transport of weapons waste byproducts
INDIANA-TO-TEXAS SHIPMENTS BEGAN 3 WEEKS AGO
CENTRAL KENTUCKY BUREAU
Citizens' groups sued the Pentagon and the Army yesterday in an effort to stop shipments of waste byproducts that result from chemical weapons destruction.
Three weeks ago, officials began shipping waste from the destruction of the nerve agent VX from Newport, Ind., to an incinerator in Port Arthur, Texas.
In a 60-page complaint filed in federal court in Terre Haute, Ind., residents of Indiana and Texas claimed the shipments violate the federal Resource, Conservation and Recovery Act and pose "an imminent and substantial endangerment to the public health and the environment."
Workers at the Indiana facility allege that the Army has understated the concentration of VX in the shipments, Mick Harrison, the lead attorney representing the plaintiffs, said in a press release yesterday. A speck of VX can kill within minutes.
The plaintiffs, which include the Sierra Club, the Berea-based Chemical Weapons Working Group and Citizens Against Incineration at Newport, also allege that the Army has refused to test the VX waste before it is shipped.
Pentagon officials did not return phone calls from the Herald-Leader yesterday.
The defendants also include Veolia Environmental Services Inc., the company hired to transport the waste.
The complaint alleges that the shipments also violate environmental justice provisions under the National Environmental Policy Act, Indiana hazardous waste laws, a federal prohibition against interstate shipment of such materials and a federal prohibition against disposal of such agents unless they have been "detoxified or made harmless to man and his environment."
"Shipping VX-containing material to Texas to burn is in breach of so many laws and regulations that we are asking the court to immediately stop these activities until we can present the full breadth of evidence surrounding our contentions," said Craig Williams, director of the Chemical Weapons Working Group.
The Army plans to destroy the Blue Grass Army Depot's 523 tons of nerve and blister agent at a chemical neutralization plant on-site. But it has not ruled out transporting the wastes, called hydrolysates, despite opposition to previous attempts to transport Newport's waste to Ohio or New Jersey.
"Its unfortunate that the government continues to persist in trying to do something that it's obvious nobody wants," Williams said