|
Posted
on Fri, Oct. 20, 2005
Another hurdle for VX
disposal
A N.J.-inspired law calls for review of Army plans for the nerve agent
By Jacqueline L. Urgo
Inquirer Staff Writer
Army
plans to dispose of caustic waste from the lethal VX nerve agent into
the Delaware River have been halted - at least temporarily - by a new
federal law.
An amendment to a defense spending bill signed this week
by
President Bush, and written by U.S. Reps. Robert E. Andrews (D., N.J.),
James Saxton (R., N.J.), and Frank A. LoBiondo (R., N.J.), calls for a
detailed review of the Army plan by the Government Accountability
Office.
The bipartisan group of New Jersey lawmakers said the
measure could
cripple the Army's plan to dump a treated, watered-down form of the VX
nerve agent called hydrolysate into the river at Deepwater, N.J. Gov.
Corzine also praised the measure, saying it sends the Army a message:
"New Jersey is no dumping ground. The Delaware River should be
treasured and protected, not harmed and mistreated."
The Government Accountability Office will determine
whether treating
the chemical at a weapons stockpile in Newport, Ind., where it is
currently being stored, is significantly more expensive - as the Army
has claimed - than risking its transport by truck or rail through four
heavily populated states.
The lawmakers said they would ask the Environmental
Protection
Agency and the Centers for Disease Control to again investigate the
Army's plan to transport as much as four million gallons of neutralized
VX hydrolysate to the DuPont Chambers Works in Deepwater, near the
Delaware Memorial Bridge. The lawmakers said they believed the agencies
would reject the plan under the new law's standards, even though they
have approved the plan in the past.
The new law calls for a review of the "adequacy of
rationale" in the
Army's dismissal of other technologies to dispose of its VX stockpile,
including the Army's refusal to build a wastewater disposal system at
the chemical depot in Indiana.
If the Army's plan to dump the VX hydrolysate passes the
new
regulatory hurdles, the material could be transported to New Jersey by
early next year. Meanwhile, Corzine and the legislators said they will
continue to work on permanently killing the Army's plan.
Scientists call VX a weapon of mass destruction.
The military counts the nerve agent among its deadliest
weapons. A drop of VX in its raw form can kill a human on contact.
It appears the Army never used VX on the battlefield
because of the
danger that the wind could blow the odorless vapor back in the
direction of the troops, according to scientists at Oxford University,
in England, where VX was developed in the 1950s.
The Army says its plan to dispose of the treated VX
wastewater in
the Delaware River is safe and would save taxpayers as much as $347
million.
Citing contract sensitivity, the Army wouldn't say how
much the
entire project could cost, nor when it would likely be completed, said
Jeffrey Lindblad, spokesman for the U.S. Army Chemical Materials Agency.
Critics say the VX disposal plan puts at risk millions
of residents
of Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania and New Jersey, as well as the
environment in general.
"We have by no means exhausted our alternatives to
ending this
plan," LoBiondo said. "The only gambling that should be done in New
Jersey is in Atlantic City, not with the lives of our residents."
Tracy C. Carluccio, deputy director of the nonprofit
Delaware
Riverkeeper Network, called the VX disposal "ill conceived and
reckless" and vowed to stand with New Jersey lawmakers in fighting the
Army.
"We will remain vigilant along with them until this
project is dead," Carluccio said.
Lindblad, the Army's spokesman, said military officials
believe they will eventually prevail.
"We're confident in our process and that this can be
done safely
with no harm to humans or the environment," Lindblad said yesterday.
|
