The Radford Army Ammunition Plant is pushing back its completion date for a new incinerator that had been scheduled to be in operation by July. The Arsenal, as it’s commonly called, now expects to complete construction of the new facility by next June.
The Radford Arsenal first announced plans to build a new energetic waste incinerator in 2018.
Justine Barati is director of public affairs for the Army’s Joint Munitions Command, which oversees the Arsenal. She said they are delaying the completion date for the new incinerator until next summer, due to heavy rains and changes to the design of the new facility.
The new incinerator will eliminate the need for open burning, which is currently how the Arsenal disposes of materials it uses to produce propellants.
“There are some things that are so energetic, that if we put them in the closed incinerators that we currently have, they would maybe destroy the incinerator or cause a safety issue for those that are running the incinerator,” Barati said.
For years, a local citizen group has raised concerns about toxic chemicals that are released into the air through open burning. An investigative report in 2021 by ProPublica pointed to past pollution levels from the plant, and says open burning could be exposing nearby residents to lead and other toxins, and putting them at risk of some cancers.
Barati and officials at the Arsenal say emissions at the facility are not high enough to be a concern to human health. But community feedback pushed them to consider alternatives.
“We want to be better neighbors, and we know this is a concern for the community,” Barati said. “So, we really advocated to develop more technology that can deal with these more energetic items that are more dangerous. And it’s because of our commitment to the community that we want to have the energetic waste incinerator and want to get it going.”
The availability of new technology also makes the phasing out of open burning feasible for the plant.
In 1980 the Environmental Protection Agency prohibited open burning of certain materials, due to the potential risks to human health. But the agency allowed it to continue at some locations, because there weren’t safe alternatives.
Now that new technology has become available, last year the EPA released a new proposed rule that would change how open burning permits are evaluated, and would prioritize using alternative methods to treat explosives waste. That rule has not yet been finalized.
Like the Radford Arsenal, most of the facilities across the country that still do open burning of hazardous waste are operated by the military.
In 2021, the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality reviewed the Arsenal’s estimates for their pollution levels and approved the Arsenal’s permit to continue open burning until 2031.
