Army asked to consider moving more chemical arms to Tooele
Opponents vow fight; act of Congress would be required

byKaren Lee Scott
Staff Writer

Transportation of chemical weapons across state lines is prohibited by Public Law 103-337, but to save time the Department of Defense (DoD) has asked the Army to consider stockpile relocation plans among other alternatives.
This means that additional chemical weapons could make their way to the Tooele Chemical Disposal Facility (TOCDF) located at the Deseret Chemical Depot (DCD).

However, DCD spokeswoman Alaine Southworth said they don’t have any plans for such activities.

The stockpile storage site switches are being evaluated to see if moving chemical weapons to existing destruction sites can help the DoD achieve the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) 100 percent destruction deadline of April 2012.

“As alternatives are being developed, the Army and ACWA (Assembled Chemical Weapons Alternatives) may develop relocation scenarios of various chemical weapons stockpiles to existing operating destruction facilities including the Tooele facility” to achieve the CWC deadline, said a DoD spokesperson.

It would take an act of Congress to change the transportation law, but because destruction has not yet started at some stockpile sites, moving the weapons may be a viable option.

But Jason Groenewold of Healthy Environmental Alliance of Utah certainly hopes not. “While the Army may not be concerned about health and safety, we certainly are, and if they try to ship chemical weapons to Utah, they better hope the trucks have reverse because we’ll force them to go back.”

Rufus Kinney of Families Concerned about Nerve Gas Incineration from Anniston, Ala. — a site similar to TOCDF — said “Transportation of chemical weapons directly violates the most basic premises of the Army’s chem weapons demil program: that each site destroy its own stockpile, that no community become a toxic dumping ground, and that no danger is posed to the citizens of other states by transporting these weapons by truck or rail through their neighborhoods.”

He said in a telephone press conference, “I can assure you that the state of Alabama will never be the toxic toilet for Kentucky’s chemical weapons stockpile. The Army will have to save money some other way. Maybe they can cut expenses by pulling out of Iraq, because the WMDs they didn’t find there are right here in the USA.”

Michael Parker, director of the Army’s Chemical Material Agency and program manager of the ACWA, said, “It is premature at this time to comment on the content of the evaluations. The Army has just received the direction from the Office of the Secretary of Defense and is currently in the process of formulating its alternative evaluation strategy.”

He added, “We have a proven track record in safely storing and eliminating chemical material, while protecting workers, the public and the environment. This will be a cornerstone of any alternatives we consider.”

The Army currently stores chemical weapons at six other sites besides DCD and Anniston, Ala. Umatilla, Ore., Pine Bluff, Ark., Edgewood, Md., Newport, Ind., Richmond, Ky, and Pueblo, Colo. are the other stockpile sites
Utah, Alabama, Oregon and Maryland are the only states with operational disposal facilities. Facilities in Indiana and Arkansas will open later this year but those in Kentucky and Colorado are not yet functional disposal sites.

e-mail: kscott@tooeletranscript.com