Chemical Facility Security: Regulation and Issues for Congress

Abstract

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has proposed security regulations for chemical facilities, implementing the statutory authority granted in the Homeland Security Appropriations Act, 2007 (P.L. 109-295, Section 550). The proposed regulations (71 Federal Register 78,276 78,332 (December 28, 2006)) require chemical facilities possessing amounts and types of substances considered by the DHS Secretary to be hazardous to notify DHS and undergo a consequence-based screening process. The Secretary would then determine what chemical facilities are high-risk, and thus need to comply with additional security requirements. The proposed security requirements would be performance-based, rather than prescriptive, and tiered, with facilities in higher tiers having more stringent requirements than those in lower tiers. High-risk chemical facilities will be required to create and submit to DHS a vulnerability assessment; create and submit to DHS a site security plan, addressing the vulnerability assessment and complying with the performance-based standards; and implement the site security plan at the chemical facility. The DHS Secretary will approve or disapprove each step in the process, requiring the chemical facility to improve the facility submission or implementation in the case of disapproval. The proposed security regulations also establish a new category of protected information, Chemical-terrorism Security and Vulnerability Information (CVI), granting it a status between sensitive but unclassified and classified information. The Secretary maintains discretion over who will gain access to this information, how it may be used, and what will comprise CVI. Additionally, the proposed security regulations will preempt state and local chemical facility security regulations.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Jan 31, 2007
Accession Number
ADA462098

Entities

People

  • Dana A. Shea
  • Todd B. Tatelman

Organizations

  • Library of Congress

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Biomedical

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Classified Materials
  • Commerce
  • Congress
  • Department Of Homeland Security
  • Governments
  • Hazardous Materials
  • Homeland Security
  • Law
  • National Governments
  • National Security
  • Personnel Management
  • Public Administration
  • Regulations
  • Risk
  • Security
  • Small Business
  • United States Government

Readers

  • Defense Acquisition Program Management
  • Emergency Management and Homeland Security.
  • Government Contracting/Procurement.