(The following is excerpted from "Chemical Weapons Disposal and
Environmental Justice" written by Suzanne Marshall PhD. and published by
the Kentucky Environmental Foundation, November, 1996, with funding from the
Educational Foundation of America.)
The Newport Army Ammunition Plant (NAAP) is located just south of Newport, Indiana
in Vermillion County, population 16,773, a decrease of almost 1,500 from the 1980 census
figures. The percentage of the population living below the poverty level has risen from
10.68% in 1980 to 11.67% in 1990, which is higher than the state average of 10.68%, but
lower than the national average. The county is racially homogenous with a 99.45% white
population. NAAP was established in 1942 to produce the explosive material RDX and
heavy water. In 1959 the Army decided to make nerve agent VX there, and in 1961
production began. Pollution from these processes is currently a problem and dangerous to
human health (Bureau of the Census, 1980, 1990; Bradbury, et al., 1994, Appendix D).
This region is rural and has other major polluters. An Eli Lily medical waste incinerator is
located just north of Clinton, Indiana. Two Public Service Indiana electric generating
plants, which primarily burn coal, are located approximately six miles and twenty miles
away. Within a 40-mile radius of Newport are Crawfordville, Indiana, home to a steel
plant and Terre Haute, a center for the plastics industry known for pollution by dioxins and
other toxins. Citizens living in the vicinity of the Newport facility are already contending
with enough pollution and should not be recipients of incineration technology when viable
alternatives exist.
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