Dayton Daily News (Ohio) May 15, 2014 Thursday SECTION: IDEAS & VOICES; Pg. A14 LENGTH: 550 words HEADLINE: Chemical facilities should concern all of us; GUEST COLUMN BYLINE: By Vickie Hennessy BODY: What would you do if you were told your child's school was in the middle of a potentially lethal chemical disaster zone? That's the urgent question I had to ask myself when I recently learned through the Center for Effective Government that 289 schools across Ohio are within one mile of a chemical facility. These facilities - water treatment facilities, chlorine processing plants, refineries and other chemical plants - are classified as "high risk," meaning that an accident or deliberate act of sabotage could release chemicals that have the capacity to injure and even kill those nearby. Together, they put over 120,000 Ohio kids at risk of lethal exposure to a chemical release. Think it can't happen here? The people of West, Texas, would beg to differ. Fifteen people were killed and over 200 injured when a fertilizer plant exploded. Houses, schools and a nursing home were destroyed. Taking a closer look in my neighboring community of Fairborn, the 900 students at Baker Middle School are less than 1,200 feet from Miami Products and Chemical Company. That's a short walk from classrooms to a company that manufactures chlorine and receives and stores chlorine gas on-site in 90-ton rail cars. According to the company's reporting to the Environmental Protection Agency, the worst-case scenario would release 180,000 pounds of chlorine into the environment. In that worst-case scenario, a cloud of chlorine gas could spread up to 14 miles from the plant - an area including Dayton, Fairborn, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Springfield, Beavercreek, Xenia, Vandalia and Kettering. All in all, almost 600,000 people live in the danger zone. It is no exaggeration to say that if there were an accident at the facility, the aftermath would be catastrophic. No one knows why the fertilizer plant in West, Texas, exploded. What we do know from last week's federal investigation is that it was preventable. In many cases, there are safer alternatives available to poison gases and other hazardous processes. In fact, the 2009, Clorox Co., a large producer of chlorine bleach, converted its U.S. factories from chlorine gas to safer chemical processes that eliminated potential for a poison gas disaster. The good news is that a solution may be near. In 2013, President Obama issued an executive order designed to improve the safety and security of chemical facilities like those here in Ohio. Nine months after the executive order was released, federal agencies were to have developed "a unified federal approach for identifying and responding to risks in chemical facilities." The deadline has been extended to June 1. The reality is that the only way to truly ensure our communities are protected is to end the possibility of a toxic gas release by converting facilities to safer, more secure alternative technologies. Most importantly, it should be mandatory for companies to change their chemical processes if such alternatives are feasible. Communities such as ours should not bear risk any longer, and our most vulnerable residents - children and seniors - shouldn't be put in harm's way. Now is the time to act to prevent disasters. Vickie Hennessy is president of Green Environmental Coalition, a Yellow Springs-based nonprofit organization that aims to preserve, protect and restore the environment. No link available