Chem Sector Security Summit Web Page Update 03-26-10

Late Friday afternoon, DHS updated their web page for the 2010 Chemical Sector Security Summit. While I noted last November that DHS had gotten an early start on advertising their annual chemical security summit, they are about a week later this year than last in announcing the preliminary agenda and providing registration information. Announced in this updated page is a similar registration restriction to that implemented last year. There will only be three reservations allowed for each organization. This is being done again this year to ensure that every organization that wishes to have someone attend will have the chance to do so. There is a link to both the registration web site and to the Hotel web page for the Summit. There is now a link to a preliminary agenda for the meeting. Many of the presentations will be about similar topics to last year's, but will reflect changes that have occurred since last June’s meeting. For example both ammonium nitrate regulations and the background checks were discussed last year. Hopefully this year there will be discussion of an upcoming final rule for the ammonium nitrate program and a description of the actual background check tool. There are some new topics that will be discussed at this year’s meeting. Cyber security and control system security will be addressed in two separate presentations. IST will be covered in a presentation and a panel discussion, reflecting the new DHS interest in this subject. And, of course, there will be a discussion of how the inspection process is progressing. Once again, this looks like a meeting that will be well worth attending.