Army's plan for mustard gas resisted by Oregon

Army's plan for mustard gas resisted by Oregon

Friday, March 29, 2002

By BRAD CAIN
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

SALEM, Ore. -- After getting a briefing from a top U.S. Army official, Gov. John Kitzhaber said yesterday he is not ready to embrace the Army's proposal to speed up the destruction of deadly mustard gas stockpiles at the Umatilla Chemical Depot.

Kitzhaber met with Assistant Secretary of the Army Mario Fiori for 30 minutes to hear details of the proposal that the 2,440 tons of mustard gas stored at Umatilla be neutralized with water instead of burned in a massive incinerator.

Kitzhaber described the meeting as cordial but said it didn't ease his concerns about the large amount of water that would be needed and about the "eleventh-hour" nature of the Army's proposal that caught Umatilla County residents by surprise.

The Umatilla Chemical Depot has completed construction of an incinerator to burn the chemical weapons and will begin testing it with dummy rockets in May. The Army stores nearly 4,000 tons of chemical weapons, including mustard, sarin and VX, in concrete bunkers.

The Army must destroy the weapons by 2008 under an international treaty. It is scheduled to begin incineration next February.

Kitzhaber said there are many unanswered questions surrounding the Army's new proposal. He said he's leery of any method that would divert large amounts of water that's badly needed by farmers in the arid region around the depot.

Then there's the issue of the 27 million gallons of contaminated water the process would create.

"Where are we going to send it? Who's going to take it," Kitzhaber said. "I'm not going to sign off on anything if we aren't totally confident it will meet all relevant environment safeguards."

Fiori, in an interview after the meeting, said Kitzhaber showed a "very good understanding" of the technical issues involved and that the governor indicated a willingness to further consider the plan.

"We put a lot of issues on the table, and we're going to continue talking," the assistant Army secretary said.

Fiori said that the Army now favors neutralizing the mustard agent with water over incineration because it would save millions of dollars and speed up disposal of those weapons by two years or more.

"Whenever you propose something new and different, people have a lot of concerns and questions," he said. "But destruction of the stockpile years earlier is something that everyone should sign off on."

Wednesday, the Pentagon said it would use a neutralization to destroy 2,600 tons of mustard gas at the Pueblo Chemical Depot in Colorado, a victory for residents and state officials who opposed an alternative plan to incinerate the gas. Neutralization plants are also under construction in Maryland and Indiana.

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