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| | Scientists urge use of mobile units to destroy non-stockpile weapons
Tuesday, Mar 9, 2004 By Alison Vekshin Stephens Washington Bureau WASHINGTON -- Switching to a mobile treatment system to destroy the non-stockpile weapons stored at the Pine Bluff Arsenal will help the Army meet a 2007 international treaty deadline for the destruction of chemical weapons, a committee of top scientists concluded in a report released Monday. Scientists with the National Research Council determined that an old plan to build a non-stockpile facility at Pine Bluff likely would cause program delays, stalling the Army's ability to meet an April 29, 2007 deadline required under the Chemical Weapons Convention. The Army agreed and already has started adopting an alternative suggested by the panel of scientists, said Jeffrey Lindblad, spokesman for the Non-Stockpile Chemical Materiel Project. In its report, the 12-member panel said the Army should use a mobile treatment system which would be simpler, more reliable, less expensive and faster. Scientists also determined that the mobile system would be safer for workers handling the munitions. The Army had requested the council, a non-profit group that advises the federal government on scientific and technical matters, form a panel to review the design of the facility intended to dispose of about 1,200 recovered non-stockpile weapons stored at the arsenal. The Army decided in November to adopt the mobile system to destroy the non-stockpile weapons stored at the arsenal, Lindblad said. "We're moving over to the (Explosive Destruction System)," Lindblad said. "EDS is something that's already been proven and successfully used." The EDS system employs a mobile unit consisting of a stainless steel vessel. It uses explosives to detonate the weapon and then injects it with neutralization agents that chemically react with the agents contained inside. The non-stockpile weapons stored at the Pine Bluff Arsenal consist mainly of mortar rounds containing sulfur mustard agent and German Traktor rockets containing a variety of materials. Lindblad said the system was successfully used in 2000 to destroy cluster bomblettes at the Rocky Mountain Arsenal in Colorado. "This alternative could perform most if not all of the tasks intended for (the facility) as currently envisaged, doing so via a demonstrated technology, with improved safety and simplicity and lower costs," scientists found. The panel questioned the Army's former plans to build and operate a combination of fixed and mobile systems at the arsenal to destroy the non-stockpile inventory. The design had called for a 25-acre site housing a 40,000-foot building as the main processing facility. Weapons containing agents would be drilled and drained in an explosive containment chamber. The agents would be piped to a reactor where they would be chemically neutralized. The panel's concerns included a lack of evidence that the facility's equipment could process mortar rounds that containing gelled or solidified mustard agent. Also, the design had not been shown to neutralize some components of the German Traktor rockets, the report said. In addition, the panel expressed concern for worker safety as a result of the number of weapons processing and handling steps involved, including the handling and moving of each munition from one processing station to another. EDS "is an environmentally sound way to go for these non-stockpile materials," said Elizabeth Crowe, an organizer at the Chemical Weapons Working Group, which opposes the use of incineration to destroy chemical weapons. "Meeting deadlines is of lesser concern than doing the job right and doing it safely," she added. The non-stockpile inventory at the arsenal accounts for about 85 percent of the known non-stockpile material in the United States. -- 30 -- |
