DuPont says it can improve VX treatment
Phosphorus would be removed from nerve agent wastewater
By JEFF MONTGOMERY / Staff reporter
11/12/2004
The DuPont Co. has reported a potential breakthrough method for controlling some types of wastewater pollution, spurred in part by public objections to a plan for treating chemical weapons disposal waste at a company complex along the Delaware River.
Nicholas C. Fanandakis, a DuPont vice president, said the process causes some phosphorus-based compounds to settle out of wastewater before it is discharged to the environment. One objection to the chemical weapons disposal plan was that those would be harmful to the river.
The process still is undergoing testing and patent reviews. If proven, the method could help DuPont remove phosphorus-related chemicals from wastewater the Army wants to ship from a nerve agent disposal plant in Newport, Ind., to the company's industrial wastewater plant at the Chambers Works in Deepwater, N.J.
Company representatives have briefed state and regional regulators on both sides of the river in recent weeks, although details about the full process have yet to become public.
"We think it could have some fairly broad applications," said Fanandakis, the general manager of DuPont Chemical Solutions Enterprise. He added that company scientists are testing the method at the DuPont Experimental Station near Wilmington.
Delaware officials and environmental activists reacted with caution.
"I think they're giving all the government officials a heads-up, saying 'We're working on this; we think we've got something you're going to want to see," said Kevin C. Donnelly, water resources director for Delaware's Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control.
Delaware Gov. Ruth Ann Minner and outgoing New Jersey Gov. James McGreevey have said they oppose the Army's nerve agent plan, citing concerns about public safety and water pollution. DuPont's industrial wastewater plant stands in New Jersey, but its discharge pipe empties into a section of the river inside Delaware.
Environmental groups claim the wastewater, which would have some qualities similar to drain cleaner before treatment, could carry small amounts of the original VX nerve agent to be destroyed in the project. The wastes also would contain two obscure and potentially toxic phosphorus-bearing compounds, ethylmethylphosphonic acid and methylphosphonic acid (EMPA and MPA) and other contaminants.
Critics, including Delaware regulators, said little information is available on toxic risks posed by the compounds, and cautioned that new discharges from the plant could worsen existing pollution problems by promoting suffocating algal blooms.
Phosphorus can act as fertilizer in water under some conditions, fueling the growth of plants and microbes that cloud the water and consume oxygen during, threatening aquatic life.
At Chambers, DuPont would add a chemical to break down one compound known to cause foul odors, then process the liquid through a patented system that also would eliminate caustic substances. Company officials said much of the EMPA and MPA would pass directly into the Delaware River.
"We didn't even really consider that treatment, from the perspective of modern wastewater treatment efficiency," Donnelly said. "In order to have any hope of swaying at least one state regulatory agency, they knew that they have to demonstrate a much higher competency."
Fanandakis said the new process, if successful, would convert more EMPA into the simpler and more-common MPA and then cause the MPA to settle to the bottom of treatment tanks. Solids removed from the wastes would go to an approved hazardous waste landfill at Chambers Works.
"The fact that they're quietly shopping some sort of new strategy makes me very skeptical," said Maya K. van Rossum, an attorney who directs the Delaware Riverkeeper Network, a regional environmental group. "Taking out the most objectionable component still leaves us with an unnecessary pollution discharge to the Delaware River. We don't need it here and there are better alternatives. They can take care of it in Indiana."
Both EMPA and MPA are phosphonates, a class of chemical widely used in industry and consumer products, including pesticides and pharmaceuticals. They are potentially troublesome when discharged into the environment.
Fanandakis said that concerns raised about the VX wastewater project provided a catalyst for completing existing phosphonate removal research. He said DuPont was seeking uses for the technology and would consider using the process at Chambers Works if the public concerns about the project remain, even if the federal agencies rule the original proposal poses little risk.
DuPont and the Army have postponed efforts to move ahead with the Chambers Works project to await an evaluation of public health and environmental risks by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
VX ranks among the world's deadliest chemical weapons, potentially lethal if even a tiny droplet touches the skin. The Army has denied that any detectable amounts of VX will survive after processing through a custom-built neutralization factory in Newport.
Under the Army's latest plan, a contractor would begin destroying a 1,269-ton stockpile of VX starting early next year to reduce risks from terrorist attack on weapons stockpiles and meet terms of a global treaty mandating disposal of mass-destruction weapons.
Newport spokeswoman Terry Arthur said the federal disease-control agency and Army began a weeklong inspection of the neutralization factory on Monday, a step in preparation for a startup of the process that could come by the end of this year or in early 2005.
The Army plans to start neutralizing its VX stockpile at a slow pace, with the entire disposal carried out under international supervision and expected to last two to four years. Although the military contractor in Newport has all permits needed for the process, DuPont needs authorization from New Jersey's Department of Environmental Protection and acceptance from Delaware to receive the wastes.
Newport has enough storage tank space to stockpile several months worth of neutralized wastewater pending approval of the DuPont disposal program in Deepwater.
Contact Jeff Montgomery at 678-4277 or jmontgomery@delawareonline.com.
