Global Security Newswire

A top health official in Montgomery County, Ohio, announced Tuesday that his department would not permit a local firm to discharge byproducts from neutralized U.S. chemical weapons into the county’s sewage system (see GSN, Oct. 7). The Dayton firm, Perma-Fix, is seeking to treat the materials resulting from the U.S. Army’s chemical weapon neutralization program in Newport, Ind.

“The sanitary department has determined that Perma-Fix’s proposal cannot be approved given the considerable number of unanswered questions, incomplete, missing or inadequate data, apparent treatment process deficiencies and the risks — health and ecological — involved,” said Montgomery County Sanitary Engineer Jim Brueggeman.

The move will stop Perma-Fix from accepting a $9 million U.S. Army contract to dispose of 330,000 gallons of hydrolysate.

A report on the project — recently completed by Northwestern University civil and environmental engineering professor Bruce Rittmann — criticized the Perma-Fix plan and called for the process to be better tested and refined before the disposal begins. Rittman also said that the Army should perform early stages of the process at its depot in Indiana.

The company must answer all of Rittmann’s concerns “before we would even reconsider (their application),” Brueggeman said.

Perma-Fix chief executive Lou Centofanti said many points in Rittmann’s analysis are “reasonable and prudent” and company officials are “taking a close look at the issues in this report” (Jim DeBrosse, Dayton Daily News, Oct. 8).