Obama cites poor security at chemical plants
Monday, February 27, 2006
Printable FormatCHICAGO TRIBUNE
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON -- Sen. Barack Obama, warning that a terrorist attack on a major chemical plant could cause disastrous results affecting potentially a million or more people, urged Monday that the federal government impose safety standards on the industry.
"Unfortunately, at many of the chemical plants in our nation, the security is light, the facilities are easily entered and the contents are deadly," Obama, D-Ill., said in a statement announcing that he and Sen. Frank Lautenberg, D-N.J., would prepare legislation to address the issue.
Under their proposal, the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Homeland Security would identify high-priority chemical threats and write security regulations. Each plant would have to conduct vulnerability studies and develop prevention, preparedness and response plans.
"Safety regulations can be implemented in a way that is flexible enough for the industry yet stringent enough to protect the American people," Obama said. "It is long past time to put the security of our nation ahead of special interests or politics."
According to federal environmental regulators, there are four chemical plants within Chicago that, if attacked under a worst-case scenario, could threaten more than a million people. Altogether, Illinois has at least 10 such facilities, with an additional 20 where a chemical release could threaten more than 100,000 people.
Obama noted that in Chicago a local television station found major security problems at a number of Chicago plants, including unguarded access points that allowed people to walk unchallenged to large chemical tanks.
Marty Durbin, the managing director of federal affairs for the American Chemistry Council and a nephew of Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., said his group has been working to have Congress advance federal legislation.
"As far as the need for federal legislation, we're in complete agreement," he said. "Our view is you need federal standards, national standards, so you have one standard."
Durbin said some 130 companies that are members of his group have made about $3 billion in security improvements since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
He declined to comment more specifically until the Obama-Lautenberg legislation has been introduced.