Pine Bluff Chemical Activity (PBCA)Pine Bluff, Arkansas

7/30/2019 Pine Bluff Chemical Activity (PBCA)Pine Bluff, Arkansas

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Pine Bluff Chemical Activity (PBCA)Pine Bluff, Arkansas

Pine Bluff Arsenal located in Southeast Arkansas, is 35 miles Southeast of Little Rockand 8 miles Northwest of the City of Pine Bluff. PBA is bordered on the East by theMcClellan-Kerr Arkansas River Navigation System and on the West by the Union PacificRailroad and U.S. Highway 65, making it directly accessible by rail, road, or waterway.The City of Pine Bluff boasts on of the busiest ports on the Arkansas River and servesas a transportation hub for the regional railroads. PBA is located 35 miles south of theLittle Rock National Airport, and 40 miles from Little Rock Air Force Base.

PBA is 8 1/2 miles long by 2 3/4 miles wide and covers 14,944 acres. It includes 952buildings which provide 3.3 million square feet of floor space, including storage bunkers.It also has 42 miles of railroad track and 2 million square yards of roads and paved

surfaces. Overall employment as of the end of FY96 included 886 Arsenal civilianemployees, 128 civilians employed by tenant activities, and a total of 59 militarypersonnel. Payroll for FY96 was $44,334,685.

The facility was established in November 1941 as the Chemical Warfare Arsenal; it wasrenamed Pine Bluff Arsenal 4 months later. Its original mission was as a manufacturingcenter for magnesium and thermite munitions. The arsenal produced its first incendiarygrenade on 31 July 1942. During World War II and the years following, the arsenal' smanufacturing capabilities continued to expand to manufacture, load and store wargases; and to fill smoke and white phosphorus munitions. The expansion includedfacilities to manufacture and store various types of chemical-filled weapons. Arsenal-

produced conventional munitions were used in the Korean and Vietnam wars. Duringthe war years, the arsenal produced millions of grenades, bombs, and shells as well asmillions of pounds of mustard and Lewisite. While the arsenal manufactured theseagents during World War II and remains a storage site for a portion of the US chemicaldefense stockpile, it has never produced a lethal nerve agent.

A biological weapons mission was added in 1953 and continued until 1969. Pine Bluffwas the site of the Production Development Laboratories, responsible for manufacturingand loading biological munitions. President Nixon banned biological weapons in 1969and manufacturing ceased. The bioweapons production facility at Pine Bluff wasabandoned and partly dismantled in 1969. In 1972, this part of the complex was

renamed the National Center for Toxicological Research, removed from the jurisdictionof the Arsenal and placed under the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare.

Currently, it manufactures chemical, smoke, riot control, incendiary, and pyrotechnicmixes and munitions. Limited production facilities also are used to manufacturechemical defense items such as clothing and protective masks. Pine Bluff is the onlyactive site at which white phosphorous-filled weapons are loaded.
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The Pine Bluff Chemical Activity maintains its stockpile on 431 acres of land is locatedin the northwestern portion of Pine Bluff Arsenal.

Selected as the sole site for the Binary Production Facility in 1978, the program wasactive until 1990.

The Pine Bluff Chemical Activity's specific mission is to store its stockpile of 3,850 tonsof chemical weapons until they are disposed of through the Chemical Stockpile DisposalProgram. The Pine Bluff Chemical Disposal Facility will use incineration technology tosafely dispose of 12.3 percent of the original US stockpile of chemical weapons. In fact,the U.S. Army is awaiting approval from the Arkansas Department of Pollution Controland Ecology to build a chemical weapons disposal facility.

The Pine Bluff Chemical Activity has safely stored blister agent, or mustard nerveagents since the 1950s and 1960s when the weapons were brought to the Arsenal. Thestockpile consists of rockets containing the liquid nerve agents GB and VX and one-ton

bulk storage containers with mustard. The safe storage of the entire stockpile isoverseen by the U.S. Army Chemical and Biological Defense Command, who ischarged with monitoring the storage.

Disposal Schedule:

Construction: 1999

Testing: 2001

Operations: 2003

Closure: 2007

AGENT ITEM QUANTITY POUNDS

HT-Blister Ton Containers 3,591 6,249,100

HD-Blister Ton Containers 107 188,400

GB-Nerve M55 Rockets 90,231 965,480

GB-Nerve M56 Rocket Warheads 178 1,900

VX-Nerve M55 Rockets 19,582 195,820

VX-Nerve M56 Rocket Warheads 26 260

VX-Nerve Mines 9,378 98,460

Pine Bluff Arsenal possesses diverse capabilities in the field of chemical/biologicalprotection. These capabilities include:

Frabrication, fill and testing of chemical/biological filters in various sizes andconfigurations


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Chemical impregnation, repair, renovation, and testing of chemical protectiveclothing Rebuild and calibration of Defensive Chemical Test Equipment

Worldwide certification to Department of Defense and contractors engaged in thetesting or manufacturing of individual protective equipment

Protective mask rebuild/repair

The Arsenal's involvement in the area of protective masks began in the late 1970s whenPine Bluff Arsenal was given the mission to produce M24/M25 A1 Masks. Today, PineBluff Arsenal is the United States Army's sole facility for repair and rebuild of the M17series, M9A1, M24, M25A1, and M40 masks, and the M20 breathing apparatus.

As the only manufacturer of white phosphorus munitions in the western hemisphere,Pine Bluff Arsenal is modernizing the WP plant originally constructed in the 1940s. Inlate September 2005, officials signed a $20 million contract for the modernizationproject with Shaw Environmental, Inc., headquartered in Stoughton, Mass. This is thecontract largest project undertaken on the industrial side. The modernization effort willimprove the safety, environmental performance, flexibility of the operations, and

efficiency of the filling of the munitions. The entire project - from design to contract - hasbeen a joint effort with PBA, the Chemical Materiel Command and PEO AmmunitionOffice.

One of the largest investments in PBA's industrial capacity since the early 1980s, thismodernization will be key component of posturing the Arsenal for future workload. It willadd state-of-the-art safety features and greatly improve production efficiency.

PBA is the only facility that uses the raw materials, which are extracted fromphosphorus rocks, and is a by-product. The form used by the military is highly energetic(active) and ignites once it is exposed to oxygen. This makes it absolutely essential to

keep it in an environment that is away from oxygen - either inside an inert atmosphereor under a layer of water. In a heated format, it is extremely dangerous and can createdamaging burns.

The design phase of the project, which took about two and a half years, was acollaborative effort between PBA, Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC)and Jacobs Engineering Group. The WP project is a very complex system because notonly it replaces the manufacturing lines, but also replaces the complete system -including supporting elements such as the scrubber and wastewater systems. This isgoing to introduce the latest environmental equipment that is available to try to minimizethe waste generated. It is going to be more efficient.

The line will be downsized as a result of the modernization, going from four to oneproduction line. The requirement for WP has been reduced. That is the reason fordownsizing. However, the Arsenal is optimizing the process at the same time and leanmanufacturing concepts will be introduced. The unique part of the process, is that WPproduction will continue through the construction phase. The WP facility is one of thelargest in production at the Arsenal. The plan is to divide the building in half and have


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the existing equipment be operational during installation of the new systems. Three newbuildings are also going to be added to the new facility - a scrubber and wastewatersystem, and storage facility.

Fabrication and installation was expected to take approximately 15 months. Testing of

the new line was tentatively scheduled for early 2007 and the new systems was set tobe online by second quarter of 2007. Additional parts of the overall project - part of thecapital investment portion - were awarded to Tri-State Industrial Contractors, Inc. ofTexarkana, Ark., for infrastructure work; High Voltage Maintenance, Inc., of Quitman,

Ark., for electrical work; and Quality Fence Company of Pine Bluff for fence work.


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The Pine Bluff Chemical Activity storage area is protected by manysecurity measures. The activity stores 12% of the nation's originalchemical stockpile.

The former BZdisposal facilitydestroyed the U.S.stockpile of theincapacitatingagent BZ between1988 and 1990.Shown is the ductwhich removedventilated air fromthe facility to thecharcoal filtrationsystem.

The former BZ disposal facility destroyed the U.S. stockpile of theincapacitating agent BZ between 1988 and 1990. The nine acre sitewill be expanded to 25 acres in order to build the Pine BluffChemical Agent Disposal Facility.
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Pine Bluff Chemical Activity (PBCA)Pine Bluff, Arkansas