Multistate organization joins opposition to VX treatment by DuPoint
By JEFF MONTGOMERY / The News Journal
09/02/2005
A multistate coalition of environmental and citizen groups urged the Army on Thursday to abandon plans for shipping wastes to New Jersey from a chemical weapon disposal site in Indiana, arguing that a safer, proven alternative is available.
The government has proposed transferring wastewater from a VX nerve agent disposal plant in Newport, Ind., to a DuPont Co. commercial wastewater operation in Deepwater, N.J., at the foot of the Delaware Memorial Bridge.
Opponents -- from groups in Delaware, Indiana, Kentucky and New Jersey -- said the Army plan would expose the public to needless hazards during highway shipments from Indiana to DuPont's plant. They favor keeping the entire disposal operation in one spot.
Delaware and New Jersey groups also said that pollutants from the wastewater could pass through DuPont's system and into the Delaware River.
"We're prepared to go to court," said Tracy Carluccio, a member of the Delaware Riverkeeper Network, a multistate conservation group. "We believe this plan is illegal under the Clean Water Act, and we believe it violates federal law in terms of transportation. We will use any means necessary to stop this plan."
The Army recently restarted a system built to neutralize the 1,269-ton stockpile of VX nerve agent at the Newport depot. VX ranks among the deadliest compounds known, and is capable of swiftly killing an adult exposed to as little as one droplet.
Craig Williams, who directs the Kentucky-based Chemical Weapons Working Group, said the Army should instead build a previously approved and proven system to cook and break down batches of the wastewater at a high temperature and pressure instead of sending the waste out for commercial disposal.
"We conclude that this is a failed approach," Williams said of sending the waste out, noting repeated problems and unexpected findings during early runs of the breakdown process at Newport.
Jeff Lindblad, a spokesman for the Army Chemical Materials Agency in Aberdeen, Md., said the military still prefers to rely on commercial treatment of the neutralized VX.
Lindblad said use of the super-critical water oxidation, or SCWO, process could add as much as $300 million and two years to the VX disposal schedule at Newport.
"If a decision is made that we're not going to go off-site, SCWO is one of those alternatives that we would look at," Lindblad said.
Williams said that the Army was using outdated studies and cost estimates.
DuPont already has treated several million gallons of neutralized wastes from a mustard, or blister-forming agent, stockpile once kept at the Aberdeen Proving Grounds in Maryland.
The New Jersey Environmental Federation and Citizens Against Incineration at Newport have supported the stand by Williams' group.
The alternative process, which can be dismantled and moved for use at other stockpiles, mainly produces a solid, saltlike waste containing heavy metals that can be safely shipped to secure landfills.
Defense officials planned to use the SCWO system to treat Newport's wastewater, but dropped the idea, trying to accelerate chemical weapon disposal work nationwide.
The Army Chemical Materials Agency wants to ship to New Jersey 2 million to 4 million gallons of caustic liquid containing byproducts from a chemical plant that breaks down VX nerve agent.
Officials have said trucks would mostly contain a liquid similar to drain cleaner, along with toxic residues from the VX breakdown that would undergo further treatment in Deepwater.
"We are never going to accept the proposal to dump this in anybody's river," said Alan Muller, director of Green Delaware. "The Army seems to get stuck on a particular path and becomes oblivious to contrary facts and the opinions of other people."
New Jersey earlier this year declared DuPont would have to seek a permit amendment to treat the neutralized VX, contradicting earlier company assertions. Acting Gov. Richard J. Codey also said he would bar shipments of the waste from the New Jersey Turnpike.
Codey and Delaware Gov. Ruth Ann Minner called on the Army to treat the waste in Indiana.
Delaware's Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control found weaknesses in an earlier DuPont plan, prompting the company to develop another treatment plan now under federal review.
Contact Jeff Montgomery at 678-4277 or jmontgomery@delawareonline.com.