Indiana Anhydrous Ammonia Leak

I haven’t commented on the continuing story of a methamphetamine related anhydrous ammonia leak last week; I figure I’ve probably beat that drum enough. A recent story on 14WFIE.com on the story does bring up another aspect of the problem that deserves some discussion, the Top Screen exclusion for farmers. On January 9, 2008 DHS published a notice in the Federal Register granting farmers and other agricultural users an indefinite extension on their requirements to submit a Top Screen if they had any of the COI listed in Appendix A to 6 CFR Part 27 at or above the screening threshold quantity (STQ) listed in that document. Part of the reason that this was done was because of the pressure applied by the Farm Lobby to grant a full CFATS exemption. This ‘indefinite extension’ (still in effect) effectively removed CFATS compliance responsibility from these facilities while DHS worked out a method to identify the high-risk Ag facilities without bothering the low-risk facilities.

Part of the justification for allowing this exemption to be put into place was that farms and such were removed from the urban centers that would be high priority terrorist targets. Thus any attacks on these facilities would have little practical effect on the nation; making them poor terror targets. Unfortunately this reasoning ignores a problem that urban and suburban planners have been dealing with for decades now, the boundaries of suburbia and urban areas are pushing further and further out into the hinterland. In the transition zones around most urban centers there is a patchwork of active agricultural land surrounded by suburban housing and strip malls. The Channel 14 news story reports that this farm anhydrous ammonia tank leak “triggered the evacuation of hundreds of people from their homes”. Now, the evacuation area was probably over-done as a matter of precaution in this instance; that is always the right thing to do on any chemical release. And, I’m not sure that, even if ‘hundreds of people’ were really at risk for a catastrophic leak at this site (which this wasn’t, it was a leaky valve), this would have raised this farm to the level of a high-risk facility if a Top Screen had been submitted. What the story certainly does show, however, is that agricultural facilities are found near population centers and thus may become ‘legitimate’ terror targets. I understand that DHS has been trying to work with the Ag Community to come up with a better way of identifying the truly high-risk Ag facilities without burdening the vast majority of the farm community with unnecessary paperwork. My late father, who owned a small ranch in California, would certainly have appreciated that effort. But, tens of thousands of other businesses were able to complete ‘needless’ Top Screens without going bankrupt. And we do need to identify any farms that are high-risk facilities to ensure that they are required to take appropriate action to prevent terror attacks on their facilities from having tragic off-site consequences. It is time to repeal the agricultural facility exemption for filing Top Screens. Only then will we be able to determine the true scope of the potential problem.