Delaware authorities: More information needed on VX waste plan

By Patricia L. Pastore/Tribune-Star

March 11, 2004

Delaware authorities say more information is needed to prove DuPont's contention that DuPont can safely treat waste created by VX neutralization at its treatment facility in Deepwater, N.J.

Citizens in New Jersey, Delaware and Indiana are opposed to transporting about 900 truckloads of the caustic, toxic waste across the country to be treated at DuPont's Chambers Works Secure Environmental Treatment Facility before being dumped into the Delaware River, which flows into the Atlantic Ocean.

Environmental groups don't want the byproduct dumped in the already polluted Delaware River. DuPont's studies have not convinced state agencies the discharge won't harm people and the environment.

After reading the 350-page DuPont VX hydrolysate treatability study issued March 4, some aren't convinced DuPont's hazardous waste treatment plant can further break down nerve agent VX hydrolysate, the byproduct of VX neutralization, into harmless substances..

"No decisions have been rendered at this point on the Army reports and DuPont's reports," said Richard Greene, an environmental engineer for the Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control. "We are looking at this from every angle possible to make sure treating VX hydrolysate is not a problem and does not result in unintended consequences."

Greene said the DuPont report is merely "a proposal." DuPont and the Army are trying to demonstrate they can do it safely, he said. "There are still some additional questions that need to be answered."

DuPont in its analysis admits that MPA and EMPA, toxic compounds formed in VX hydrolysate, won't be broken down in the treatment it utilizes.

Nerve agent VX is the deadliest of all Cold War chemical weapons, according to Army reports.

"The biggest problem with the report is DuPont did no research on the EMPA," said John Kearney, spokesman for the Delaware Clean Air Council. "It has always been done by computer modeling based on MPA, which is not acceptable because this is a military unique compound not found in any other substance. DuPont's report said, 'No model or experimental chronic hazard data were available for EMPA, therefore, it was not possible to calculate the chronic risk quotients for EMPA.'"

Kearns contends the reason DuPont did not conduct independent testing is because "the results would not have been acceptable, showing damage to the Delaware River ecosystems."

The New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection would be grossly negligent if they allowed a militarily unique substance, without any actual testing on it first, to be dumped into the Delaware River, he said.

Fred Mumford , a media spokesman for the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, did not return repeated phone calls.

Perma-Fix of Dayton, Ohio had a contract with the Army's contractor, Parsons Technologies, Inc., to treat VX hydrolysate. Ohio citizens opposed bringing the VX hydrolysate to their community from Newport and Ohio authorities refused to issue the permits necessary for Perma-Fix to treat VX hydrolysate.

Parsons rescinded its contract with Perma-Fix last year.

A report issued by the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency recommended that no waste from VX be dumped in any waterway until further studies were done.

Kearns is hopeful the New Jersey and Delaware state environmental agencies "will now make the same recommendations the Ohio EPA did," he said Wednesday.

The DuPont plant in New Jersey dumps its waste streams into Delaware waters in a portion of the river in the city of Wilmington, Del.

Kearney said he will work with the Wilmington City Council to ban the dumping of the treated VX hydrolysate into Wilmington waterways.

A DuPont engineer believes the substance would be satisfactorily diluted in the river.

"The amounts of EPA and EMPA and phosphonic acid to be released in the river are within standards, said Todd Owens, a DuPont chemical engineer. He admitted no studies have been done on EMPA and MPA although they are part of other effluents that are put into the Delaware River by companies whose industrial process uses phosphonic acids in the making of detergents and pesticides, he said.

Once the effluent containing the MPA and EMPA is put into the river, the water will further dilute it, Owens said. He said it will go into the river below the salt line and is in the right environment for biodegradation.

He admits he is uncertain how long it takes for total destruction of the EMPA and MPA.

"I believe it's months, not years," Owens said. "The biodegradation time is unknown. We aren't talking about generations."

Green Delaware, another environmental group, plans to file a lawsuit if DuPont is given a contract to destroy VX hydrolysate.

Alan Muller, spokesman for Green Delaware, said DuPont's answer to treating EMPA and MPA is dilution.

"You have heard of the old adage 'the solution to pollution is dilution,'" Muller said. "The more people look at this, the more they are going to realize how unacceptable it is. DuPont is doing a huge number on the environment. This isn't harmless waste water."

Vermillion County residents are opposed to sending toxic waste to pollute another state's environment.

Sara Morgan, spokeswoman for the Newport Citizens Against Incineration, is appalled at what she read in DuPont's assessment of hydrolysate treatment, she said.

"I am not convinced that DuPont can actually treat VX hydrolysate at this time to the extent that the waste should be released into the Delaware River, the bay and then to the ocean; therefore, I continue to question the advisability of shipment," Morgan said. "More information is needed since DuPont's report states that it is 'not possible to quantitatively analyze for every compound that might be present' in the hydrolysate. The report also states that two hydrolysate byproducts -- MPA and EMPA -- are not destroyed by DuPont's proposed treatment."

Morgan has repeatedly said VX hydrolysate is a Vermillion County problem that should not be sent elsewhere.

"We made it here and we can treat it here," she has said.

The Speedy Neut plan to destroy VX ahead of the 1996 original target date has been put on hold twice and is scheduled to begin this summer, possibly in June, said Col. Jesse L. Barber of the Army's Chemical Materials Agency alternative technologies and approaches project.

"Off-site treatment of the caustic wastewater [VX hydrolysate] is the only option that allows us to start agent destruction operations in 2004," Barber said Wednesday in a news release.

Patricia Pastore can be reached at (812)231-4271 or pat.pastore@tribstar.com