VX Plan Goes to Court--The right venue

Published: Monday, January 1, 2007

The fight over the Army's plan to truck 4 million gallons of a hydrolysate to a DuPont Co. treatment plant in Salem County and then ultimately discharge the waste into the Delaware River is now headed for court. Good.

Hydrolysate is a caustic substance left over after deadly VX nerve agent -- one drop can kill a man -- is neutralized. Under the terms of a 1997 international treaty, the Army is destroying the VX at a chemical-weapons depot in Indiana. And the question of whether the hydrolysate can be safely pumped into the Delaware River, 30 miles upstream from the Delaware Bay's oyster beds, has raged for months.

Federal court, where several environmental and watchdog groups filed suit recently to block the plan, may be the best place to resolve this dispute.

One key issue will be how much VX remains in the hydrolysate. The lawsuit cites a federal law banning the interstate shipment of chemical weapons. The Army says the amount of VX in the hydrolysate is negligible but acknowledges that existing technology can only measure VX down to 14 parts per billion. Concentrations as low as 20 to 25 parts per billion have been shown to kill fish.

So ... sounds like a dangerous plan, right? Especially considering the value of the fragile Delaware River and Delaware Bay ecosystems. That's why opposition to the Army's plan has been vocal and widespread.

But ... support for the plan has come from some credible sources. The head of the Rutgers University Haskin Shellfish Laboratory has dismissed concerns about negative effects on aquatic life. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have signed off on the plan. The Press has even received letters from oystermen who said that after reviewing all the data, they became convinced the plan is safe.

But the Delaware Riverkeeper Network, the American Littoral Society, the Chemical Weapons Working Group of Kentucky, Pennsylvania Clean Water Action, the Delaware and New Jersey Audubon societies and the New Jersey Environmental Federation have now taken the matter to court.

And that's good -- because this is a job for a Solomon. And while the lawsuit means this debate will meander along for some time to come, that's OK, too. Sometimes, the maddening slowness of the American system is wise and necessary.