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Subject: Nation of "Registered" Poisons - Will The Reality Of Terrorism Cure Us Of Our Toxic Addictions?
Date:
Mon, 25 Feb 2002 16:54:33 -0500
From: Stephen Tvedten <steve@getipm.com>
Organization: Get Set Inc. (www.getipm.com)
To: Paul Helliker <phelliker@cdpr.ca.gov>
Director, State of
California, Department of Pesticide Regulation
cc: Christine Whitman whitman.christine@epa.gov
Nation of Poisons - Will The Reality Of Terrorism Cure Us
Of Our Toxic Addictions?
David Corn is the
Washington
editor of The Nation. His first novel, Deep Background, a political thriller,
was published recently by
St. Martin
's Press.
Editor's Note: This article originally appeared in OnEarth
magazine
On September
11, a small group of highly disciplined fanatics demonstrated that the
achievements of an industrial society can be turned into powerful weapons
against it. They also delivered an unsettling reminder that the
United States
is vulnerable to certain forms of terrorism because it is dependent upon a
variety of hazardous products and processes. In the shock-ridden aftermath of
the attacks, it was easy to envision acts of terrorism targeting not just
airplanes and skyscrapers, but also nuclear reactors, chemical plants, oil
refineries -- acts that could transform industries based on toxic substances
into instruments of death.
This reality should reshape the way the nation thinks about
environmentalism. Leaders and citizens of the
United States
and other Western countries now are able to see (if they wish to see) that
technologies long challenged by environmental advocates are potential sources of
immense danger in an era of terrorism. The prospect of attacks on such targets
also undermines the old accusation that environmentalists care more about
animals, bugs, and trees than they do about people and modern society. That
cliché will have less power as environmentalists endeavor to protect the nation
from extremists who have our toxic vulnerabilities in their sights. Osama bin
Laden and his crew have pondered how to strike at power plants, how to hijack
nuclear waste to use in a bomb. There may be other terrorists yearning to take
human-made threats to land, water, air, and life and, as the experts say,
weaponize them. Environmentalism is now a cause that seeks to disarm the
fanatics.
Bin Laden has exposed a serious domestic security weakness
of the
United States
: its dependency on poisons. Chlorine gas for bleaching paper. Uranium for
generating electricity. Pesticides for increasing crop yields. Cyanides for
making plastics. For decades,
America
has elected to live with various poisons in order to have more and cheaper
goods and power. The potential hazards to people and the environment posed by
these substances -- and by their manufacture, storage, and transportation in
large quantities -- were often dismissed. This country, like many others,
tolerated the assorted costs: environment-damaging spills, increased cancers,
occupational injuries, the buildup of toxic wastes that could not be permanently
and safely disposed of.
On September 11, the price of this relationship with toxics
went up. A small, but important, example: Concern is growing that firefighters
and rescue workers at the
World
Trade
Center
who did not wear respirators may suffer lingering health problems. If a
chemical plant using, say, chlorine or phosgene were targeted, the long-term
health damage among survivors could be far worse. In the days and years to come,
environmentalism will have to be an essential component of counterterrorism.
Enviros have become arms controllers.
The worst terrorism nightmare being contemplated these days
is a nuclear bomb. A small nuclear bomb detonated on the ground in
New York City
could kill at least 100,000 people -- possibly many more -- and contaminate the
area for years. "You'd basically have to abandon it," says Matthew
Bunn, a nuclear weapons expert at Harvard. Fortunately, manufacturing a nuclear
bomb is a challenge for terrorists, and would-be bombmakers first have to
acquire weapons-grade uranium or plutonium. (There have been several cases of
this material being stolen from nuclear facilities, however.)
But it's no secret that an easier route for terrorists
would be obtaining an existing nuclear weapon. Since the collapse of the Soviet
Union, national security experts have worried that Russian "loose
nukes" could be bought on the black market. The United States has spent
several billion dollars in the past decade to bolster security for the Russian
nuclear arsenal, but many of the security programs have slowed or been
underfunded in recent years.
Another nuclear threat is the "dirty bomb" -- a
conventional bomb spiked with radioactive material. Think of TNT strapped to a
container of plutonium or plutonium-contaminated waste. Such a device would not
produce a nuclear explosion, but it could spread deadly radioactive matter
across a swath of city. Hundreds, maybe thousands, would die from radiation
poisoning and cancer, and the area could be poisoned for years. (Plutonium has a
half-life of 24,000 years.)
Terrorists would not need weapons-grade material for this
type of bomb. In October, the London Sunday Times quoted a Bulgarian businessman
who claimed a bin Laden associate had asked him to set up an environmental
company to buy nuclear waste. He said he declined the offer. Beyond nuclear
explosions and dirty bombs, September 11 prompted fears of assaults against
nuclear power plants, nuclear waste storage sites, nuclear waste transports,
nuclear research reactors, and nuclear weapons facilities. There are more than a
hundred nuclear power plants in the nation, and Nuclear Regulatory Commission
(NRC) studies have found that a meltdown at a single plant could lead to more
than 100,000 deaths.
One bin Laden associate has testified in court that he was
taught how to blow up power plants. During a recent training exercise at the
Nevada Test Site, two armed "terrorists" were able to seize control of
a nuclear plant and "detonate" a bomb capable of sending radiation
into the surrounding area. Nor is the reactor the only target at a nuclear power
plant. Spent-fuel storage areas -- where used radioactive rods are kept at many
plants -- are not designed to withstand an airplane crash. The NRC notes that
the consequences of a spent-fuel accident "could be comparable to those for
a severe reactor accident."
Besides the nuclear infrastructure, there exists another
large set of environmentally sensitive targets: chemical facilities. In the
United States
, there are 20,000 facilities and factories handling dangerous chemicals in
large enough volumes that they are required to file reports with the
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Several hundred plants have filed
risk-management plans indicating that a worst-case scenario at their sites could
spread toxic chemicals as far away as 14 miles or more. The 1984
Bhopal
chemical plant accident in
India
caused an estimated 2,000 deaths and 100,000 injuries. After a 1976 accidental
release of chemicals at a factory in
Seveso
,
Italy
, 270 acres of land were contaminated and had to be evacuated completely.
A 1999 government study found that
chemical plant security ranged from "fair to very poor."
Last year a Department of Justice study concluded that
"the risk of terrorists attempting in the foreseeable future to cause an
industrial chemical release is both real and credible." A year earlier, a
terrorism commission pointed out that terrorists, rather than developing
chemical or biological weapons of their own, "might prefer" to
engineer a chemical disaster by assaulting an industrial plant or storage
facility. A 1999 government study found that chemical plant security ranged from
"fair to very poor."
Terrorism orchestrated specifically to produce
environmental havoc is hardly farfetched. The vulnerabilities are many. In
October, when a drunken hunter shot a hole in the pipeline that carries Alaskan
oil to the rest of the country, nearly 300,000 gallons spilled and the flow of
oil was disrupted for three days. The 800-mile pipeline runs above ground for
400 miles and has been recognized for years as a potential target. And there are
19,000 miles of interstate natural gas pipeline alone. (The oil industry is
asking for tax credits and low-cost financing for security improvements, as well
as an end to "regulatory impediments" that it claims hurt security.)
Boston
officials have been worrying about a strike against a tanker carrying natural
gas -- which security experts call "the poor man's atomic bomb" --
into the city's harbor. Indeed, ports are particularly vulnerable, as fuels and
hazardous materials are often stored there with little security.
Some of the targets politicians and pundits have mentioned,
though, may not be easy to hit. Catastrophic failure of the electricity grid
would be difficult for terrorists to bring about. A bomb could easily cause a
local power failure, but, as long as utilities keep their stockpiles of repair
components up to date, repairing local power failures is business as usual for
the utility industry. The 1998 ice storm in the Northeast, which triggered a
long-term power disaster, did so because it brought down power grids over
thousands of square miles -- which would be a tricky feat for humans.
After September 11, media accounts raised the possibility
of terrorism against water supplies. EPA rushed to form a water protection task
force. There are 168,000 public water systems nationwide, and security has been
lax at many. But water terrorism may not deserve a spot high on the list of
real-world worries. The
Henry
L.
Stimson
Center
's Chemical and Biological Weapons Nonproliferation Project dismisses the
possibility that terrorists could poison entire water supplies: "If
terrorists were to attempt to poison a reservoir, they would need to disperse
truly huge amounts of agent into the water -- smaller amounts would be diluted
-- and the vessels required for such a feat would be difficult to miss."
EPA administrator Christie Whitman maintains that a "truckload" of
contaminant would be needed.
Nevertheless, September 11 signaled that this nation is
loaded with toxic targets. Government officials rushed to deal with the threat
by ordering better security at sites such as nuclear power plants. If the
nation's leaders could gaze past immediate concerns, they might also discern the
longer-term security need for a national discourse on reducing the country's
toxic addictions. For such a discussion to occur, the public requires
information about the hazards within its midst. Yet part of the government's
response to the attacks has also been an over-hasty, knee-jerk instinct to
smother information on environmental threats. Which means citizens will know
less about everyday toxic risks within their communities and about potential
terrorist targets.
The better-safe-than-sorry impulse of bureaucrats was
understandable. Who wants to provide useful information to the next Mohamed Atta?
After the attacks, even the Federation of American Scientists, which has long
worked to challenge excessive government secrecy, pulled from its Web site
information on the locations and layouts of little-known foreign nuclear weapons
facilities. "We wanted to think about this," says Steven Aftergood,
director of the secrecy project. But, he adds, "I oppose stuff being
removed indiscriminately from government Web sites when there is little
connection to terrorism and when it's done without consideration for competing
interests."
Take the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. After the attacks,
its Web site dropped a reference library for nuclear information, material on
evacuation routes, nuclear regulations, and reports regarding safety and
accidents at nuclear plants. As the nonprofit Public Citizen complained,
"This type of data has nothing to do with a reactor's vulnerability to an
attack, but provides the public with data on accidents and mishaps at reactors
caused by human or mechanical error."
Web sites were the main casualties of the information
clampdown. According to a list compiled by OMB Watch, a public interest group,
the state of
Pennsylvania
withdrew data on water and air quality and mining operations. The state of
New Jersey
removed information on tens of thousands of chemical storage sites.
(Firefighters often accessed this data on their way to fires.) The EPA yanked
risk management plans (RMPs), which contain information about potential chemical
accidents and response plans at 15,000 sites.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention withdrew a
report that referred to security shortcomings within the chemical industry (but
did not mention specific problems at particular facilities). The Los Alamos
National Laboratory cut off access to scientific reports in its unclassified
database. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission withdrew documents containing
specifications for energy facilities. The U.S. Geological Service pulled reports
on water supplies in the
United States
.
Some of the material no longer accessible on the Internet
may still be available to members of the public dedicated enough to work through
the process of requesting it directly from the agencies. But there were other,
potentially more far-reaching, moves against public information. Attorney
General John Ashcroft instructed federal agencies to use a tighter standard in
releasing materials in response to Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests.
And Senator Jeff Bingaman (D-NM) circulated a draft energy security bill that
would have severely restricted government's need to respond to FOIA requests.
NRDC's Barbara Finamore and Geoff Fettus found that in some cases, the changes
could "take an enormous bite" out of environmental review of
government or industry activity.
Has the no-need-for-you-to-know crowd
exploited September 11?
"There can be a difficult balance between security and
information," says Gary Bass, executive director of OMB Watch. "But we
can distinguish between knowing that a dangerous chemical is sitting in the west
wing of a specific facility on the third floor in a 10-gallon drum --
information that arguably should be kept from public view -- and knowing that if
an accident happens at this facility there would be a toxic plume reaching 4.3
miles." The very purpose of RMPs, notes Bass, is to help people negotiate
hazard reductions. To do that, they need to know about the hazards.
Public knowledge can even enhance security. Bass points to
the Blue Plains wastewater treatment works in the
Washington
,
D.C.
, area. An RMP noted that a railcar full of chlorine was at the site and that in
a worst-case scenario, a cloud of deadly chlorine could reach the White House.
Consequently, environmental groups -- before September 11 -- lobbied for the
car's removal. After the attacks, tons of liquid chlorine and sulfur dioxide
were quietly taken out of the facility.
Some government agencies, such as EPA, have said that they
will check the material removed from their Web sites and consider reinstating
it. This step is critical, notes Aftergood of the Federation of American
Scientists. "Otherwise, people will take advantage of the situation to
remove information to serve agendas other than security."
The clampdown is a secrecy windfall for industries that
have been fighting public information initiatives for years. For instance,
thanks to industry influence, public reporting of chemical industry accidents is
so spotty that no one knows how many deaths they cause, says D.C. environment
writer Joseph A. Davis. (The most comprehensive estimate to date was 256 a year,
on average, from 1987 to 1996.) Has the no-need-for-you-to-know crowd exploited
September 11?
After the attacks, the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a
pro-business lobby, called for a "permanent removal" of chemical
facility RMPs from both EPA's Web site and its reading rooms around the country.
The American Chemistry Council asked EPA to block all public access to the
reports detailing worst-case accident scenarios -- reports which were only
available in reading rooms. The pipeline industry has lobbied Congress to remove
right-to-know provisions from pending legislation.
NRC chairman Richard Meserve called September 11 a wake-up
call. But the alarm that rang that awful day called the nation to do more than
improve fences and hire more guards. The country must look at itself anew. As
nuclear weapons expert Matthew Bunn observes, "A world that includes highly
capable terrorist organizations with a global reach is a world that is less
favorable to technologies that concentrate immense quantities of value and
potential vulnerability in one place."
Which means that an effective anti-terrorism strategy must
reduce the long list of industrial sites that are high-value targets.
Environmentalism meets national security: There can be common ground between
hawks and greens.
Lessening the nation's reliance on toxic products and
toxics-producing processes is a tougher and grander -- and more profound -- task
than tightening borders, improving coordination among the many government
agencies with antiterrorism responsibilities, or stockpiling vaccinations for a
biological attack. It calls for an examination of society's relationship with
assorted poisons.
Is having the whitest of white paper worth the widespread
presence of chlorine? Should the American appetite for cheap power be fed by
reactors churning out lethal waste sought by terrorists? Ultimately, the goal is
to detoxify American society. Prior to September 11, there was good reason for
doing so. Afterward, the need is more evident. And this is a challenge unlikely
to be met if the public possesses less, rather than more, information about the
vulnerabilities we have created for ourselves.
Published:
Feb 19 2002
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