Justice Department outlines security roadmap for chemical plants
The Justice Department has published a plan to help thousands of U.S. chemical plant operators assess their vulnerability to terrorist attack and identify necessary security measures to prevent or mitigate attempts to use chemical facilities as potential weapons of mass destruction.
The National Institute of Justice report marks one in a series of federal initiatives to help the industry beef up security as intelligence officials warn of possible terrorist attacks on chemical factories and shipping routes.
A guide for assessing a facility's security weaknesses, A Method to Assess the Vulnerability of U.S. Chemical Facilities was compiled with the assistance of the Energy Department's Sandia National Laboratory, responsible for assessing the vulnerability of critical U.S. infrastructure. Also participating in the effort were the Office of Homeland Security, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Transportation Department and the chemical industry.
"The use of the vulnerability assessment methodology is limited to preventing or mitigating terrorist or criminal actions that could have significant national impact-such as the loss of chemicals vital to the national defense or economy-or could seriously affect localities-such as the release of hazardous chemicals that would compromise the integrity of the facility, contaminate adjoining areas, or injure or kill facility employees or adjoining populations," according to the report.
The methodology includes steps to determine the level of threat posed by insiders, outsiders or a combination of the two; identify the most likely means of attack at a particular facility, whether theft, destruction, violence or bombing; and measure a facility's ability to detect an attack, delay it, or respond in order to defeat an adversary.
The report underscores the importance of "protection in depth," so that potential attackers must breach several security barriers to succeed. Should those barriers fail, however, measures must be in place to mitigate the effectiveness of an attack, it says.
"When the protection system cannot prevent an undesired event, mitigation features can reduce consequences, thus reducing risk," according to the report. "Mitigation features range from sensors that cause systems to shut down and assume fail-safe condition if a problem is detected to early warning systems that alert first responders," the report says.
Growing concern that chemical plants could be terrorist targets has forced an industry re-evaluation of facility security. Congress this year passed the Chemical Security Act, requiring enhanced security measures at the thousands of U.S. facilities, particularly those most at risk.
Last month the Defense Department official responsible for reducing the threat of weapons of mass destruction, Stephen Younger, said he was increasingly concerned about the vulnerability of the U.S. chemical industry, including the transportation of deadly chemicals.
The Bush administration and Congress, however, have had difficulty agreeing on security standards, while chemical industry officials have been accused of dragging their feet on new and costly security enhancements.
The Justice document marks an effort to provide industry with some of the tools necessary to meet new security standards.
In advising chemical industry officials on assessing security weaknesses, the report also provides guidance on making recommendations to reduce the risk of attack. "The goal is low-cost, high-return upgrades," it says.
For example, instituting upgrades that can reduce risk against multiple threats "should be considered first because this can result in greater protection against many scenarios," the report says.
To create the new roadmap the agency collected threat information, data about current security measures at chemical plants and inspected a variety of facilities, officials said.