U.S. Seeks New Chemical Weapons Waste Disposal Plan

The U.S. Army is seeking a new plan for disposing of waste produced by chemical weapons neutralization at the Newport Chemical Depot in Indiana, following DuPont’s announcement that it would not perform the work, the Associated Press reported today (see GSN, Feb. 2).

“We’re back to square one and we’ve returned to reviewing all the options available.  That includes disposal either on or off site,” said Greg Mahall, spokesman for the Army Chemical Materials Agency.

Weapons disposal at Newport is expected to produce 1.8 million gallons of hydrolysate wastewater.  DuPont had agreed to treat the waste at a facility in New Jersey, and then discharge it into the Delaware River.  That plan withered under fierce opposition from environmental organizations and officials from Delaware and New Jersey.

The Army is considering four options for eliminating the wastewater without moving it from the depot, Mahall said.  All of the plans would require construction of a treatment plant, which would take several years, AP reported.

The options are incineration, chemical oxidation, wet-air oxidation, and high-pressure treatment to produce solid matter that could be placed underground at a landfill.

The Newport Chemical Agent Disposal Facility has destroyed 40 percent of the chemical agent at the depot, creating 613,000 gallons of hydrolysate.  Disposal is scheduled to finish in summer 2008.

The state has issued a permit allowing the depot to store as much as 2.4 million gallons of wastewater on site, said Indiana Environmental Management Department official Tom Linson.

“They keep adding space as they need it,” he said.  “Of course, they were banking on being able to ship that hydrolysate out at some point in time.  Now, there’s really no clear path open for them” (Rick Callahan, Associated Press/phillyBurbs.com, Feb. 2).

Two studies released yesterday indicated there would be no cost savings from shipping wastewater from weapons neutralization at plants in Colorado and Kentucky to another location for treatment, the Lexington Herald-Leader reported.

The Army has argued that transporting 6 million gallons of waste from the Blue Grass Army Depot in Kentucky alone would save as much as $52 million.

However, a report by the independent firm Mitretek found that facing public opposition and potential lawsuits to the waste relocation, along with changing regulatory permits, could delay the effort by years and eliminate any savings. 

The Assembled Chemical Weapons Alternatives program, which is managing weapons disposal efforts at Blue Grass and Pueblo, Colo., reported that opposition and permit changes could delay off-site shipping by 66 months.  The cost would be nearly $150 million more than expected if the waste were treated at the depots, the Herald-Leader reported.

The Chemical Destruction Community Advisory Board for Blue Grass is set to make its recommendation on the matter at its next meeting on March 13 (Cassondra Kirby, Lexington Herald-Leader, Feb. 2).

The Colorado Chemical Demilitarization Citizens Advisory Commission on Wednesday voted unanimously against off-site shipments of wastewater from the Pueblo Chemical Depot, The Pueblo Chieftain reported (John Norton, The Pueblo Chieftain, Feb. 1).

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