[CPEO-MEF] Bechtel venture is picked to destroy depot's weapons

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Kentucky
LEXINGTON HERALD-LEDGER
Bechtel venture is picked to destroy depot's weapons
By Greg Kocher
Posted on Tue, Jun. 17, 2003

A joint venture between two California companies, one of which was
recently selected to lead the rebuilding of postwar Iraq, has been
awarded a contract to destroy the chemical weapons stockpile at Blue
Grass Army Depot in Madison County.

Late last week, the Department of Defense selected Bechtel Parsons Blue
Grass to design, build, operate and close a plant that will destroy the
524 tons of chemical weapons and other munitions stored at the depot
between Richmond and Berea. The work will span a decade and has an
estimated total cost of $2 billion, according to the company.

Bechtel Parsons Blue Grass is a joint venture of Bechtel National Inc.
of San Francisco and Parsons Infrastructure and Technology Group Inc. of
Pasadena. The program has four subcontractors: Washington
Demilitarization Co., Battelle Memorial Institute, General Physics, and
General Atomics.

Bechtel has been in the news since April, when the U.S. Agency for
International Development awarded it the major contract to rebuild Iraq,
a project that could be worth $680 million over 18 months.

The first order of business under the Blue Grass Army Depot contract is
to develop a plan to design and build the plant that will destroy the
chemical weapons.

The plant design might be finished in a couple of months, said Craig
Williams, executive director of the Chemical Weapons Working Group, a
national coalition based in Berea that advocates the safe
non-incineration of chemical weapons.

There are already talks under way to have the state Natural Resources
and Environmental Protection Cabinet authorize other aspects of the
project not related to weapons destruction. Those include aspects "like
the laboratory, the support buildings, getting utilities in, putting in
roads, parking lots -- all the kinds of things you're going to need
regardless of the final design of the treatment facility," Williams
said.

This article can be viewed at:
http://www.kentucky.com/mld/heraldleader/news/local/6105103.htm

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