VX Waste More Dangerous Than Claimed, Groups Say

Groups opposed to incinerating VX disposal waste in Texas have claimed that the material is more dangerous than acknowledged by the U.S. Army, the Beaumont Enterprise reported Friday (see GSN, May 1).

The Army is paying Veolia Environmental Services in Port Arthur $48 million to eliminate 1.8 million gallons of hydrolysate wastewater produced by chemical agent neutralization at the Newport Chemical Depot in Indiana.

That amount is “significantly” higher than standard payments for eliminating caustic waste, the Sierra Club and other organizations said Thursday in a new notice of intent to sue to block the program.

“This suggests that the Army knows that the (material) contains the higher levels of VX and (other toxins) … and is not simply a caustic waste,” according to the document.

A new environmental impact assessment is warranted, given the amount of money in the contract, the groups said.

The study “would be expected to show that a number of available alternative treatment methods could be used to effectively treat the (wastewater) and at considerably less cost,” according to the notice.

“The Army’s 2002 EA (environmental assessment) does not discuss or analyze the risk of international attack or hijacking of (material) shipments, including the intentional and malicious addition of large quantities of acid to allow the reconstitution of VX,” it adds.

A lawsuit and injunction request to halt waste shipments are expected to be filed in a matter of days in Indiana, according to Craig Williams, head of the Chemical Weapons Working Group.

The Army has argued that transporting and incinerating the wastewater is safe.  The contract amount is related to the high sodium content of the hydrolysate, which requires special handling to prevent damage to the incineration kiln, Veolia environmental and health safety manager Daniel Duncan told the Enterprise.

“We’ve developed a mechanism to eliminate that occurrence, but there is some extra handling and pretreatment involved in that process that does cost extra money, time and effort,” Duncan said.  He said the high amount of sodium in the waste is intentional and prevents any concentration of VX (Mike Smith, Beaumont Enterprise/Chemical Weapons Working Group, May 4).

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