News of the Week
Plan to destroy Iraq's chemical arms unveiled A United Nations Special Commission charged with eliminating Iraq's weapons of mass destruction— including chemical and biological weapons and ballistic missiles—has filed its first, sketchy plan for data collection and for obtaining possession of and/or disposing of these weapons. The commission, headed by Swedish diplomat Rolf Ekeus, also is working closely with another UN body, the International Atomic Energy Agency, on Iraq's arsenal of nuclear-weapons-grade materials. IAEA inspectors, just returned from surveying Iraq's nuclear-related facilities, believe they have located all its declared stockpile of enriched uranium, but are gathering additional data. Within a couple of weeks, a Special Commission team, which will be led by Australian disarmament expert John Gee, will visit Iraq to inspect declared and suspected chemical weapons storage and production facilities. The team will mark munitions and facilities with tamperindicating devices. It also will be responsible for monitoring tagged
locations from the time of inspection to ultimate disposal of materials. The team will operate from a just-established field operations office in Bahrain, with support from an office to be set up in Baghdad, Iraq. Disposal of chemical arms via neutralization and /or incineration is likely to take a year or more. And according to the plan, "movement of chemical weapons and agents will be minimized." The commission is looking into using mobile destruction equipment, but also is considering building a destruction facility in Iraq. Iraq says it has no biological weapons storage or production facilities. A commission team will verify if this is so. If a production facility is unearthed, Ekeus says, it will be destroyed. The final stage of the commission's plan, once weapons are removed or destroyed, is monitoring to ensure Iraq's continued compliance with the UN cease-fire resolution. Such verification will be effected through on-site inspections— including some on short notice—at military bases, production and storage facilities, and research plants and labs. Lois Ember
Utilities to cut C0 2 emissions 20% by 2010 Two of the nation's largest utilities—Southern California Edison and the Los Angeles Department of Water & Power (DWP)—have taken to heart the finding of a recent National Academy of Sciences report that "despite the great uncertainties, greenhouse warming is a potential threat sufficient to justify action now." Each utility pledged last week to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, considered a primary contributor to global warming, 20% below 1989 levels by the year 2010. The two utilities account for just under 1% of annual U.S. C 0 2 emissions, which totaled about 5.3 billion tons in 1989. Worldwide emissions were 24.2 billion tons. DWP's plan will eliminate 3.6 million tons of C 0 2 per year at a cost of about $12 million annually. DWP 6
May 27, 1991 C&EN
emitted about 18 million tons of C 0 2 in 1989. Without the reduction plan, it projected emissions of over 24 million tons per year by 2010. Edison will reduce emissions from its 1988 level of 32 million tons per year to about 26 million tons in 2010, compared with a projected 39 million tons. The utilities, which burn very little coal, say they will achieve these reductions through energy conservation and efficiency programs, modernization of existing facilities, elimination of fuel oil use, renewable resources development, electrification programs, and forestation projects. Edison chairman and chief executive officer John E. Bryson says, "It is sound scientific, utility, and business policy for us to take actions now that are not unreasonably cost-
ly to reduce C 0 2 emissions over the next two decades . . . whether or not C 0 2 emissions are eventually determined to cause global warming, Edison will not be sorry it took early action." Janice Long
End urged to faculty mandatory retirement The statutory exemption that permits mandatory retirement of tenured faculty at U.S. colleges and universities should be allowed to expire at the end of 1993. That's the bottom-line recommendation last week of a National Research Council committee that studied the effect of removing the exemption. When Congress amended the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA) of 1967 in 1986, it prohibited mandatory retirement on the basis of age for almost all workers. But the amendments included an exemption, to terminate at the end of 1993, allowing mandatory retirement of academic faculty at 70 years of age. This recognized a fear by some people that postponed retirements would prevent hiring new faculty, traditionally a source of new ideas. The NRC study, requested by Congress, sought to establish if the special circumstances of tenured faculty justify continued exemption from national policy prohibiting age discrimination in employment. The panel makes recommendations involving such areas as faculty pensions, health insurance, and other retirement policies. But it notes that most of its recommendations are based on two main conclusions. The panel found that at some research universities, a high proportion of faculty would choose to work past age 70 if mandatory retirement is eliminated. Faculty who are research oriented, enjoy inspiring students, have light teaching loads, and are covered by pension plans that reward later retirement are more likely to work past age 70. But the panel also found that at most colleges and universities, few tenured faculty would continue working past age 70 if mandatory retirement is ended. James Krieger
