A spate of deadly chlorine bomb attacks in Iraq is prompting the Bush administration to urge nearly 3,000 municipal water treatment plants in the United States to make sure their chlorine gas is well protected -- spotlighting what Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff has singled out as a "gap in our system of regulation."Although some plants have switched to less dangerous methods of disinfecting drinking and waste water, many still add chlorine gas to kill bacteria. The gas can also be used as a chemical weapon. In recent months, Iraqi insurgents have started attaching chlorine cylinders to car bombs and roadside explosives to burn people's lungs, eyes, and skin downwind from a blast.
With chlorine bombs becoming a high-profile weapon of choice for terrorists abroad, officials at the Department of Homeland Security fear that terrorists might try to copy the tactic, making chlorine tanks at water plants, which range from 150-pound cylinders to 90-ton rail tankers, an obvious target for sabotage or theft.
There are 1,700 drinking water facilities and 1,150 waste water plants that still use chlorine, including about 50 in New England that keep at least 2,500 pounds of the chemical on site, according to data from the Environmental Protection Agency . In Massachusetts alone, 22 water plants are currently registered as chlorine users with the EPA.
In a recent speech, Chertoff urged water authorities to pay for whatever fences, cameras, and guards are necessary to "make sure that these dangerous chemicals they have on site are not stolen, because, unfortunately, if you look over to Iraq, you're going to see these kinds of chemicals wind up in improvised explosive devices."
Chertoff has no power to do anything more than urge vigilance on the part of water treatment plant operators. Although Congress passed a law in October giving his department the power to make sure that most chemical facilities have effective security, lawmakers exempted water treatment plants from the new regulations. "For those of you who are not subject to regulation, I don't want you to breathe a sigh of relief like 'We're off the hook,' " Chertoff said. "You're on the hook, because you're going to have to do this yourselves until the time comes along that regulatory authority to address these is given to us or to some other agency."
Today , the House Homeland Security Committee will hold its first oversight hearing on chemical security this year, and some watchdog groups are now calling on Congress to revisit its October 2006 chemical security legislation to make it tougher. Among the critics' chief targets is the exemption for water treatment plants. "There's 10 things wrong with the chemical security rules, and I list this one first," said Rick Hind , legislative director of the Greenpeace Toxics Campaign. "The water treatment plants exemption is easiest to understand. Three thousand facilities -- wow, that's a big omission."