CHEMICAL & ENGINEERING
fflkWS EY JL-Li | w N L V V J U 0 FUH L- Y APRIL 14, 2003 - EDITED BY WILLIAM G. SCHULZ & MELISSA BRADDOCK
COUNTERTERRORISM
BUSH SECURITY BILL DRAFTED Department of Homeland Security to oversee assessment of vulnerability HE BUSH ADMINISTRATION
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is close to releasing a manda tory chemical plant security bill, say congressional and Ad ministration sources. If the bill moves ahead, it would end more than a year of government waffling over what path to take to protect the pub lic from a terrorist attack on a chemical plant. Fears over public safety have intensified in the past few weeks with publication of a General Accounting Office report that was critical ofAdministration in action and with a rehash in the media of EPA and other data showing that millions of people could be killed or injured in a ter rorist attack at a chemical plant (C&EN, March 31, page 19). According to a Senate Envi ronment & Public Works Com mittee aide, security experts in the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) have written the Administration bill and present ed it to the committee. Committee Chairman James M. Inhofe (R-Okla.) has agreed to introduce the bill at the Pres ident's request, the aide said. The bill would be similar in con cept to legislation offered more than a year ago by Sen. Jon S. Corzine (D-NJ.), the aide con tinued, but with two significant differences that the chemical in dustry had fought hard for but that Corzine and environmen talists had opposed. First, the bill would give DHS, HTTP://WWW.CEN-ONLINE.ORG
rather than EPA, enforcement oversight for the program, and second, it would not call for com panies to reduce use or on-site storage of toxic chemicals. Con sequently, it would not encour age inherently safer chemical manufacturing practices. Corzine's bill required compa nies to consider, but not neces sarily adopt, inherently safer tech nologies as an alternative to guns and guards at their facilities and placed EPAin charge of oversight because of its chemical industry knowledge. EPA had seemed to agree with Corzine's aproach. Only two weeks ago, EPA Adminis trator Christine Todd Whitman told a chemical industry trade association that the Adminis tration had designated EPA as the lead agency for chemical plant security (C&EN, April 7, page 11). However, the Senate aide said: "We and the President see this as a homeland security issue, and it should be overseen by that de partment. We don't think the federal government should be dictating to chemical plants what kind of chemicals they use or products they put out. That is sue has nothing to do with chem ical plant security. EPA already has insight and oversight over what goes on inside a chemical plant." As described by the Adminis tration source, the Bush bill ap pears nearly identical to the Amer
ican Chemistry Council's volun tary program to improve chemi cal plant security (C&EN, Oct. 28,2002, page 29). The bill, how ever, would make that program mandatory and would probably cover some 15,000 U.S. compa nies that handle large quantities of dangerous chemicals. The Administration bill, the source continues, would require companies to conduct their own terrorist vulnerability assess ments, implement counterterrorism measures, and certify that they took counterterrorism steps. It would be tiered, requir ing the most vulnerable compa nies to take action first. The as sessments and certifications would be classified and unavail able to the public. When the bill might actually see the light of day is unclear. Administration officials said it would probably be introduced "by the end of the month." The Senate committee staffer ini tially told C&EN that it would be introduced in the middle of last week but later backed off that assertion. Meanwhile, Corzine and his al lies in Congress and elsewhere re main committed to his approach and promise a congressional de-
Corzine
Inhofe
bate.-JEFF JOHNSON
PRESENT DANGER A tank car spews chlorine gas at the DPP Enterprises Chemical Plant, Crystal City, Mo.ρ on Aug. 14, 2002. Chlorine gas storage facilities are also potential targets of terrorists. C&EN / APRIL U ,
2003
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