Richmond Register
March 12, 2002

Citizens' group studies incineration alternative

by LUKE BRADSHAW
Register News Writer

During the monthly Kentucky Citizens' Advisory Commission meeting Monday night, commission members looked at the arduous road ahead and how they would deliver a recommendation to the Defense Acquisition Board concerning a technology decision on how to destroy the stockpile of weapons stored at the Blue Grass Army Depot.

Program Manager for Chemical Demilitarization representative Brint Bixler gave some deeper insight to the Silver II method of destruction by providing answers posed at the last CAC meeting.
"We should strive hard for a consensus that we and the community all strongly support," said Doug Hindman, CAC co-chairman. "To the extent we can't agree at that level, I recommend that we be willing to define consensus as, 'I can live with the recommendation. It may not be my first choice, but I know that agreement and unity is more important than the other alternative I prefer.'

"To the extent we cannot reach a consensus, I recommend the majority rules." Hindman said he hoped it would not come to that point. He will circulate first drafts of the letter to the DAB for comment in the upcoming week. There will be informal discussions between CAC members to identify where agreement is not obvious. He also requested that CAC members try to identify at least two groups the commission will target for input.

Bixler clarified some of the concerns conveyed by those at last month's meeting. Some of those included decontamination of metal parts by heat treatment and the PCBs that are in the firing tubes of rockets. "We structured our solution along the line of how essentially the existing baseline (incineration) is set up," Bixler said. "We have a Silver II plant for agent destruction, a Silver II plant for energetics destruction and then we have metal parts and dunnage treatment systems. In the case of rockets, the punch and drain is the same (as baseline), but we have modified the extraction process for the energetics."

Electrochemical oxidation, known as Silver II, uses a modified disassembly process. After the munitions are opened and liquid agent is drained, the agent cavity is cleaned with water and steam. Agent and slurried energetics are held and fed into separate electrochemical oxidation units. These units add silver and nitrogen compounds and feed the result into an electrical cell. The electricity creates silver II ions that oxidize the material. The silver and nitrogen are recovered and recycled.

Metal parts and shredded dunnage are heat treated using nitrogen and steam, which is different than an oven, Bixler said. Steam is used to help vaporize any agent from the metal surface. Gases from these processes pass through catalytic converters and carbon filters before release. Liquid effluents are held and tested before being release to pollution control systems. Solid residues are disposed of in a landfill.

One major concern was what is done with the carbon after this part of the process. Bixler said activated carbon that has been used in the filters is monitored. Spent carbon gets run through the heat treatment process.

The firing tubes get sent through the heat treating trains, however the Silver II trains do not. PCBs would vaporize off the parts, and at least be partially destroyed in the post heater and catalytic units in those trains. There is a monitoring system to detect PCBs and other hazardous materials through analysis of carbon filters and the scrubber liquid.

All of the neutralization technologies are proposed for Kentucky use modifications of baseline disassembly. Agent and energetics are neutralized and destroyed or hydrolyzed with water or sodium hydroxide. Gelled agent or heels in munitions are cleaned either by power washing or by tumbling in a rotating drum of neutralizing solution.