[CPEO-MEF] Perchlorate Language in Senate Mil Con Approps Report

[Aimee Houghton <aimeeh@cpeo.org>]

The following language appears in the Senate Military Construction Sub 
committee report:

Perchlorate

The Committee is growing increasingly concerned about the potential impact 
of perchlorate contamination at installations that have been closed through 
the BRAC process as well as at active and inactive defense sites. 
Perchlorate, a chemical used in solid rocket propellant, has been 
identified by the Environmental Protection Agency [EPA] as an unregulated 
toxin. Perchlorate contamination has been found in drinking water supplies 
in 29 States, including California, Texas, Colorado, Maryland, and 
Massachusetts. More than 300 groundwater wells in California are 
contaminated with perchlorate, as is the Colorado River, which supplies 
drinking water to more than 15,000,000 people in the Southwest.

According to the EPA, the Department of Defense and the National 
Aeronautics and Space Administration are responsible for 90 percent of the 
perchlorate produced in the United States. Although the EPA last year 
concluded in a draft assessment that perchlorate could pose a risk to human 
health at drinking water concentrations of just one part per billion, the 
Federal Government has yet to set a drinking water standard for 
perchlorate. Therefore, no remediation standard exists. The EPA assessment 
has been referred to the National Academy of Sciences for review, which 
could significantly delay the establishment of a national drinking water 
standard for perchlorate.

The Committee recognizes that, absent a state or Federal standard for 
perchlorate, the Department of Defense is under no legal obligation to 
remediate perchlorate contamination at defense sites. However, the 
Committee is disappointed that the Department has been unresponsive to 
requests to test for perchlorate at BRAC properties or other defense sites.

To ensure that the Department is prepared to respond quickly and 
appropriately once a perchlorate standard is determined, the Committee 
directs that the Department take the following actions:

(1) Submit to the congressional defense committees no later than December 
31, 2003, a report on the activities of the Interagency Perchlorate 
Steering Committee of the Department of Defense that was established in 
January 1998 and was originally chartered to facilitate and coordinate 
accurate accounts of technological issues (occurrence, health effects, 
treatability and waste stream handling, analytical detection, and 
ecological impacts) related to perchlorate contamination of drinking water 
supplies and irrigation water supplies and to create information transfer 
links for interagency and intergovernmental activities regarding such areas 
of concern. The report shall cover all activities that were identified in 
the memorandum of the Deputy Under Secretary of Defense (Environmental 
Security), dated January 24, 2001, to the Secretaries of the military 
departments and the Director of the Defense Logistics Agency.

(2) Identify sources of perchlorate on BRAC properties and develop a plan 
to remediate perchlorate contamination on BRAC sites that can be 
implemented rapidly once State or Federal perchlorate standards are set. 
The Department shall report to the congressional defense committees on its 
perchlorate findings and remediation action plan no later than March 30, 2004.





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Aimee R. Houghton
Associate Director, CPEO
1101 Connecticut Avenue, NW, Suite 1000
Washington, DC  20036
tel: 202-452-8039; fax: 202-452-8095
Email: aimeeh@cpeo.org
www.cpeo.org
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