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HEADLINES
New bill added to chemical security stewpot
After introduction of a new bill focusing on drinking water system security alone, congressional action on chemical facility security affecting water and wastewater plants will likely be delayed until September. Congress' usual month-long summer recess begins Aug. 10. (See also Washington Report.)
The Drinking Water System Security Act of 2009 (PDF) (HR3258) was introduced July 20 by Rep. Henry A. Waxman, D-Calif., chairman of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, the same committee handling the health reform legislation. This bill would require the US Environmental Protection Agency to establish risk-based performance standards for community water systems serving more than 3,300 people and certain other public water systems with security risks. USEPA would be required to assign covered water systems to risk tiers, to require them to identify vulnerabilities and develop site security plans. Covered water systems with dangerous chemicals in amounts higher than federal thresholds would be required to assess whether they can switch to safer chemicals or processes. The Energy-Commerce Committee's Subcommittee on Energy and Environment had scheduled, but then postponed, a hearing into HR3258 as well as the broader Chemical Facility Antiterrorism Act of 2009 (HR2868), which has already been approved and also sent to the Energy-Commerce Committee by the House Committee on Homeland Security. HR2868 places wastewater plants under the jurisdiction of the Chemical Facilities Anti-Terrorism Standards, administered by the Department of Homeland Security. CFATS already ranks chemical facilities into tiers of risk, requires vulnerability assessments and site security plans — the same that HR3258 would ask the USEPA to do. The two bills would mean that water and wastewater plants, even operated by one utility, would be regulated under different sets of chemical facility security regulations administered by two different federal agencies. Other issues involved in the two bills are the granting of authority to mandate water and wastewater treatment plants to switch to "inherently safer technologies" and whether or not unions should be privy to vulnerability assessment information on plants in which bargained-for employees work. Meanwhile, the one-year extension of the current CFATS program, which expires Sept. 30, remains a third viable alternative to deal with the matter. That would continue to exempt water and wastewater plants from the CFATS requirements. Congress required certain drinking water facilities to perform vulnerability assessments and develop emergency response plans under the Public Health Security and Bioterrorism Preparedness and Response Act of 2002. Chemical security efforts at other water and wastewater plants are voluntary — a gap that both DHS and USEPA believe needs to be filled. The one-year extension, preferred by the Obama administration, is contained in HR2892 and S1298, the Fiscal Year 2010 appropriations bills for the Department of Homeland Security, which have passed both houses and are now in conference. Other fodder for congressional digestion on the issue comes from a Congressional Research Service report issued July 13 — "Chemical Facility Security: Reauthorization, Policy Issues, and Options for Congress" (PDF). Issues raised by that report include whether DHS has sufficient funds to adequately oversee chemical facility security; whether the federal regulations should preempt state regulations; how much information developed for chemical security purposes may be shared outside the facility; whether chemical facilities should be required to adopt or consider adopting "inherently safer technologies." Speaking during an AWWA webinar July 29, DHS official Dennis Deziel, deputy director for the department's Infrastructure Security Compliance Division, said CFATS division has gotten extra funding and has hired 120 additional staffers in anticipation of handling an increased workload, should wastewater (and possibly drinking water) plants come under its purview. Additional AWWA Resources
Sandy Nance, Managing Editor
Posted: 08/04/2009
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