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Previous by Date: Subject: Acrolein aka Acrylaldehyde Date: Tue, 6 Nov 2007 15:31:26 -0800 Author: "Larry D. McLouth"

Next by Date: Subject: Re: Homeland Security Chemical Facility Antiterrorism Standards Date: Wed, 7 Nov 2007 13:38:02 -0800 Author: Ron Rinehart

If you haven't noticed, DHS released the Chemical Facility  
Antiterrorism Standards' Appendix A last week:

http://www.dhs.gov/chemicalsecurity

The rules seems to have taken many of the comments from the laboratory  
community into account. But, there are public perception issues, as  
expressed in the New York Times:
>
> November 7, 2007
> Editorial
> Chemical Industry 1, Public Safety 0
> Air travelers are asking for trouble if they show up for a flight  
> with 3.5 ounces of shampoo in their carry-on bags. But the  
> Department of Homeland Security has decided that the government  
> should not even trouble chemical plants to account for the storage  
> of anything under 2,500 pounds of deadly chlorine. The department’s  
> new rules on reporting stockpiles of toxic chemicals, issued last  
> week, have certainly made the industry happy. They should make the  
> public worried.
>
> Chemical plants — and petroleum plants, paper mills and other  
> industrial facilities that use dangerous chemicals — are one of the  
> nation’s greatest vulnerabilities. An attack on such a facility  
> could create a deadly chemical cloud that would put hundreds of  
> thousands of people in danger. Just consider the result of an  
> accidental train derailment in North Dakota in 2002 — a cloud of  
> deadly chemicals hundreds of feet high and several miles long — and  
> magnify it by what would happen if terrorists planned and carried  
> out an attack in a highly populated area.
>
> The government should be doing everything it can to guard against  
> such catastrophes.
>
> The Bush administration has shown repeatedly, however, that it does  
> not want to impose reasonable safety requirements on chemical  
> plants. That may have to do with its general opposition to  
> regulations, or it could be connected to the enormous amount of  
> money the chemical industry spends on lobbying and campaign  
> contributions. The industry does not want to bear the expense of  
> serious safety rules, and it fights them furiously. In a recent  
> study, Greenpeace reported that the chemical industry spent more  
> money in a year lobbying to defeat strong chemical plant legislation  
> than the Department of Homeland Security spent on chemical plant  
> security.
>
> The rules the department issued last week are far too lax about when  
> facilities need to report stockpiles of chemicals like chlorine,  
> fluorine and hydrogen fluoride to the government. According to the  
> new rules, which watered-down proposed rules that the department had  
> released in April, a chemical plant does not have to report the  
> storage of 2,499 pounds of chlorine, even if it is located in a  
> populated area — or across from an elementary school.
>
> If 450 pounds of chlorine are stolen, enough to cause mass  
> casualties, the theft need not be reported. Chlorine has been used  
> by insurgents in Iraq, and it is high on the list of chemicals that  
> should be kept out of terrorists’ hands.
>
> It is troubling that these industry-friendly rules were developed in  
> part by Department of Homeland Security employees who previously  
> worked for the chemical industry — and who may one day work for it  
> again. Rick Hind, the legislative director of the Greenpeace Toxics  
> Campaign, contends that such employees have had an “undue  
> influence.” The department says it draws on former chemical industry  
> workers simply because of their “relevant prior experience.”
>
> Bennie Thompson, the Mississippi Democrat who is chairman of the  
> House Homeland Security Committee, has rightly compared the chemical  
> storage rules to “putting a Band-Aid on a broken leg.” Congress  
> needs to step in now and pass a strong new chemical plant law — one  
> that puts more weight on the safety of the public and less on  
> industry’s bottom line.
>
>
>
>

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