After five years of deliberation, the Army has decided that continuing chemical and biological defense tests at Dugway Proving Ground will not hurt the Utah environment.

The Army gave public notice Wednesday that it has adopted a "programmatic environmental impact statement" that it began in 2001 to look at cumulative effects of such testing at numerous sites nationally, including Dugway. It finds no dire impacts.

But critics say the new document may be designed mostly to help the Army avoid detailed future study of any new testing and missions that it may propose at Dugway.

Steve Erickson, director of the Citizens Education Project, said the Army can now refer to findings in that newly adopted document to allow simple, additional "environmental assessments" on new proposals instead of much more intensive "environmental impact statements."

"But they've been doing that anyway in recent years. This is an attempt to paper over their backside. But it's not like they've ever done a good one (environmental study on impacts) anyway," said Erickson, a longtime critic of Dugway.

The Army said in a record of decision that environmental impacts of continued biological and chemical defense testing at Dugway and other sites nationally "will be negligible to minor and mitigable."

In reaction, Erickson said sarcastically, "Gee, they've never had problems at Dugway before, so why should they in the future?"

Several problems have occurred there, ranging from a 1969 nerve gas accident that killed 6,000 sheep in nearby Skull Valley (which some ranchers say also led to health problems for their families) to disclosures that the base secretly aimed some biological arms at human volunteers to test effects.

The Deseret Morning News also disclosed in recent years that scientists at Dugway designed at-sea tests that exposed many Vietnam-era sailors to biological arms, and Dugway spread toxic chemicals from airplanes nationwide to simulate how more deadly chemical and biological arms might disperse in winds.

The new document, however, said, "All practicable means to avoid or mitigate environmental harm . . . have been adopted."

For example, it notes that Dugway now uses "simulants" in outdoor tests instead of actual, deadly chemical and biological agents against which it is testing defenses.

"Simulants are required for outdoor . . . testing, because the release of biological or chemical agents to the open air is strictly prohibited by law," the new study says.

It said that any biological simulants used are those "commonly found in nature that have been determined to present minimal risk to humans or the environment."

Laboratory testing at Dugway — where actual deadly chemical and biological agents are still used — presents little environmental impact, the study said, because of tight security, state-of-the-art filtering and careful handling of agents.

It said any use of human volunteers in testing is also closely regulated and subject to laws designed to protect and fully inform volunteers.

The newly adopted study says the Rhode Island-size Dugway base in Tooele County is the Defense Department's "major range and test facility base" and "primarily serves as a chemical-biological testing center."

It notes that Dugway also holds a license for radiological testing and may use radioactive substances as tracer materials. It says the base also uses open-air laser testing, noting that many detector systems use lasers.

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E-mail: lee@desnews.com