NEWPORT, Ind. -- The Army is seeking to extend the time it can store a nerve-agent byproduct at the Newport Chemical Depot after it fired a subcontractor in the VX disposal project.

Environmental officials will hold a public hearing Thursday at the Newport Lions Club on the Army's request to modify its permits for the disposal project, which was mandated by an international treaty.

The Army has been reviewing its options since last month, when Dayton, Ohio-based Perma-Fix was dismissed after Ohio residents complained about the planned disposal of the treated waste in their local sewer system.

The Army stores more than 1,200 tons of VX at the depot in Newport, about 30 miles north of Terre Haute. Treating the deadly nerve agent is expected to yield about 900,000 gallons of hydrolysate, which chemists have compared with household drain cleaner.

Officials had planned to build storage tanks to hold the byproduct for 90 days until it could be shipped to Perma-Fix. The Army now wants permission to store about 12,000 gallons of the hydrolysate for longer than 90 days.

The Army also wants to store at Newport some of the materials left over from the demolition of the facility where the ingredients that make VX were combined.

The VX was scheduled to be destroyed by April 2007 under the Chemical Weapons Convention international treaty. Congress ordered the process sped up following the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.