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Posted
on Sat, Jan. 06, 2007
Nerve agent plan dumped
DuPont will not be helping the Army dispose of 4 million gallons of
watered-down VX in the Delaware.
By Troy Graham
Inquirer Staff
Writer
Under heavy pressure, DuPont Co. yesterday dropped out
of an Army
plan to dispose of caustic wastewater from the destruction of the
deadly VX nerve agent in South Jersey.
DuPont's decision ends the three-year fight over the
plan. Up to
four million gallons of treated, watered-down VX would have been
shipped by truck or train through four states from a chemical weapons
stockpile in Indiana to DuPont's Chambers Works in Deepwater, Salem
County. There, it would have been dumped into the Delaware River.
"There will be no VX byproduct dumped in the Delaware
River," said
U.S. Rep. Robert Andrews (D., N.J.). "This is a real victory for the
residents of South Jersey and the health of the Delaware River."
The plan to dispose of the wastewater drew sharp
opposition from the
public, elected officials and environmentalists. A coalition of
environmental groups filed a lawsuit against the Army last year in U.S.
District Court, and many of the regulatory issues remained unresolved.
"It's hard to ever know what's the straw that broke the
camel's
back," said Tracy Carluccio, the deputy director of the Delaware
Riverkeeper Network, one of the plaintiffs in the lawsuit. "All of this
was working on DuPont and showed them this was really not in their best
interest to move forward."
DuPont said the science involved in treating and
disposing of the
wastewater was sound, and the plan was safe, but the company recognized
that many hurdles remained.
"DuPont has had a successful history of working with New
Jersey
regulators and communities, and we value those relationships," said
Nick Fanandakis, a DuPont vice president and general manager. "However,
during the three-year evaluation of the... proposal, it has become
increasingly clear to us that the approval process will be lengthy and
arduous."
The Army approached DuPont shortly after Sept. 11, 2001,
when it was
ordered to accelerate the disposal of chemical weapon stockpiles that
could be targeted in a terrorist attack, said DuPont spokesman Anthony
Farina.
In the next three years, DuPont's Chambers Works safely
disposed of
seven million gallons of wastewater from neutralized mustard gas, he
said.
In 2003, the Army proposed a plan to dispose of
wastewater from a
neutralized VX nerve agent stockpiled at the Newport Chemical Depot in
Indiana. That plan sparked outcry from the public and environmentalists.
The company held 90 public meetings, revised its
proposal, and had
the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention review it. Farina said
the company won over many skeptics in the process.
"Even with all that support and the traction from all
that, it
became clear that the regulatory process would be a long one," he said.
"I think there was a lot of misinformation about the Newport proposal
initially."
Army officials said they would explore all options for
the
wastewater. Environmentalists have called for the Army to store the
wastewater at Newport, rather than trucking it elsewhere for treatment
and disposal.
New Jersey's congressional delegation lined up against
the Army's
plan to bring the wastewater to Salem County. In 2005, Congress
required the Army to submit a cost-benefit analysis of the plan, then
have the Government Accountability Office review the analysis.
The GAO is supposed to issue its report this month.
Farina said he
has heard that the GAO would support the Army's position, and that
DuPont's decision to back out of the plan had nothing to do with the
forthcoming report.
Environmentalists said they thought the GAO's report
would be bad for DuPont.
"If it was going to be good, do you think they would be
dropping
it?" asked Jeff Tittel, the director of the New Jersey Sierra Club. "We
thought the Army had a lot of nerve to dump on New Jersey. We're glad
they lost their nerve."
New Jersey's elected officials praised DuPont's decision.
"This is a decisive victory for the people of New
Jersey," Gov.
Corzine said. "VX nerve agent is one of the world's most deadly
chemical compounds and dumping it in a river never made any sense."
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