The Newport Chemical Depot in Indiana last week completed destruction of its stockpile of chemical warfare material, the U.S. Army announced (see GSN, July 30). The facility for almost four decades stored 1,269 tons of liquid VX nerve agent in bulk containers. Chemical neutralization of the material began in May 2005 and ended Friday.
"This day marks a tremendous milestone for the workers at Newport, the citizens of Indiana and the rest of the world," Conrad Whyne, head of the Army Chemical Materials Agency, said in a press release. "Newport's stockpile has been safely eliminated, which brings the United States one step closer to fulfilling the commitment of destroying our nation's chemical weapons."
The United States has now eliminated 55 percent of a chemical agent arsenal that originally stood at more than 30,000 tons, completing operations at Newport, Johnston Atoll and the Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland. Operations continue at four U.S. sites and have yet to begin at two storage depots (see GSN, July 8). The Chemical Weapons Convention requires the United States to finish off its full stockpile by 2012, though U.S. officials have acknowledged they cannot meet that deadline. Congress had mandated that work be completed by 2017.
Treatment of caustic wastewater produced by neutralization at Newport is expected to be completed within a matter of weeks at a private plant in Port Arthur, Texas. The Army would then ask the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons to verify completion of operations at the Indiana site (U.S. Army Chemical Materials Agency release, Aug. 11).
That would be followed by an 18-month to two-year project to disassemble and remove the disposal technology, the Associated Press reported.
Operations at Newport had cost $1.2 billion by late May (Associated Press/Courier-Journal, Aug. 12).
"The successful elimination of the 1,269 tons of VX nerve agent over the past 39 months represents a major, historic step forward in protecting American citizens, removing a potential target for terrorist attack, and fulfilling our legal obligations under the international Chemical Weapons Convention," Paul Walker, head of the Security and Sustainability Program at the environmental organization Global Green USA, said in a press release.
"However, the Bush administration and the U.S. Congress have failed to adequately fund the safe destruction of chemical weapons in both the U.S. and Russia today, thereby delaying the process for a decade or more and potentially undermining the global ban on this whole class of weapons of mass destruction," Walker added.
An extended funding program and a stepped-up schedule are necessary to meet the congressional deadline, which hinges upon disposal of weapons stored in Colorado and Kentucky, Walker said (Global Green USA release, Aug. 11).