Israel has an acute problem of ammonium nitrate factories located next to residential areas, warns Danny Kronenberg. Due to national security concerns and censorship citizens don't know their locations

“There’s a story about a rickety bridge that stood in the legendary Polish shtetl of Chelm, from which many people fell off and were injured,” engineer Dani Kronenberg tells me.

“But rather than fix the bridge, the wise men of Chelm decided to open a hospital next to it to treat the wounded. Government ministries in Israel can act like the wise men of Chelm: Rather than solve the severe problem of ammonium nitrate factories located next to residential areas, they can establish a committee to run a competition for architects and sculptors, aimed at a plan to commemorate the victims of the foreseeable disaster. If they won’t join forces to prevent the disaster, at least the contingency plans to create a monument will enable quick and efficient action after it happens.”

For historical reasons, many dangerous plants in Israel are in industrial zones near [residential] neighborhoods

Kronenberg is an expert in hazardous materials (aka hazmat: toxic and flammable substances that can endanger life and the environment) and has written and translated several books on the subject, among them "Emergency Response Guidebook for Hazardous Materials Incidents."

The chemical compound he mentioned, ammonium nitrate, was the cause of a massive explosion at Beirut Port in August 2020 that destroyed a large part of the city and led to many casualties.

“Ammonium nitrate is used mostly for farming but also for other industries, such as explosives, and to manufacture chemicals like laughing gas for applications in the field of medicine,” he explains. “It’s a vital material used in creating fertilizer to stimulate growth and increase crop yield. You can’t run modern agriculture without it, and it has no substitute. We are obligated to store a strategic reserve of it in Israel" – which does not manufacture the compound and must import it – "and disruptions in the global supply chain during the COVID-19 pandemic only proved the importance of it.”

After the explosion in Lebanon, some investigators blamed Hezbollah for keeping the material there to make explosives. Is that true, or was it intended for agricultural purposes?

"We know that the port was controlled by Hezbollah. We don’t know anything beyond that."

How much ammonium nitrate blew up there?

"According to a CIA report, there were about 1,800 tons stored there, and the amount that blew up was 560 tons."

What can we conclude from that?

"Israel has factories that stores large quantities of ammonium nitrate close to population centers. It’s only a matter of time until a severe catastrophe takes place because of such a cache."

And the rules in effect aren’t good enough?

"Regulation in Israel is poor. According to the regulations here, the safety distance that should have been maintained from the cache in Beirut would have been 15 to 25 meters."

"Yes. Obviously it’s irrelevant, because a large swath of Beirut was destroyed in the explosion. Israel's Economy and Industry Ministry must update its regulations."

Maybe it’s so unusual it couldn’t happen here?

"It will absolutely happen here too. There will be a massive disaster from hazardous materials, and there will be destruction and damages in the billions."

How has it not happened until now?

"Such incidents are relatively rare, but when they happen, the results are horrific. Risk is defined according to a mathematical calculation of an incident’s chances of occurring, multiplied by the level of damage that can be expected to result. In the case of ammonium nitrate, even though the likelihood of occurrence [of an explosion] is low, the sheer intensity of the damage it could cause constitutes a high overall risk factor mathematically, and therefore ammonium nitrate is a very high risk factor. Lebanon hasn’t recovered from the explosion to this day."

At which plants in Israel is there ammonium nitrate?

"There’s a problem with censorship, so I can’t talk about it. For historical reasons, many dangerous plants in Israel are in industrial zones near [residential] neighborhoods. In this country the authorities don’t respect the public’s right to know the risks we face. The population of communities where it is relevant to them know nothing about the size of the stores of ammonium nitrate at plants in their area."

And they don’t know about it at city halls in such communities?

"They know. The nearby plants also know, but they can’t do much about it."

The disaster in Beirut, Kronenberg explains, was a result of a fire that broke out near a huge store of ammonium nitrate that had been sitting in a warehouse for years: “The moment this chemical gets heated up, it becomes unstable and creates an explosion. In Beirut, there were 218 fatalities and over 6,000 injured, but there have been many explosions like that around the world in recent decades. It’s not the worst instance. In Texas in 1947, there were huge explosions that caused the deaths of 581 people. In 1921, 561 people were killed in Oppau Germany. In 1942, 189 people were killed in Tessenderlo, Belgium, and in 2015, in Tianjin, China, 173 people were killed. These are just a few examples. There have been dozens of disasters, some of them smaller in scale.”

“Last March, a fire broke out at a fertilizer plant in the fifth-largest city in North Carolina, Winston-Salem. About 600 tons of ammonium nitrate were being stored at the plant there. Emergency and rescue services concerned that the warehouse would explode and cause one of the largest explosions in the history of the United States evacuated about 6,500 residents from their homes, within a radius of 1.6 kilometers [1 mile] from the plant. They followed the rules. The fire progressed relatively slowly. The rain that fell and reduced the height of the flames helped. The explosion that they were worried about didn’t occur, but the residents who had been evacuated weren’t allowed to return to their homes for several days until the danger subsided.”

Are you warning that this could also happen in Israel?

“That or something much more serious. In industrial zones near quiet residential communities, there are plants where large quantities of ammonium nitrate are stored.”

“A typical ship that transports ammonium nitrate holds about 2,500 tons. Based on the requirements of the [Israeli] Environmental Protection Ministry, the maximum size of an ammonium nitrate cache at a plant is 500 tons; at any one plant, there could be several such deposits in separate places. One day such a plant could be the site of a horror scenario and cause one of the most serious disasters ever to occur in Israel. The intensity of the explosion of a 500-ton ammonium nitrate reserve could approach the huge force of the explosion that destroyed the Beirut port and its surroundings.”

“It would begin as a regular day. The workers at the plants would be working normally. Some would be operating sophisticated machinery that huge sums were invested in. At noon they would go eat hummus and pita at restaurants in the area. Passengers would be waiting for a train approaching a nearby station; some residents would be at home. Kids would be playing at their kindergartens. Routine.

“And then all of a sudden, a fire ignites near one of the ammonium nitrate storage areas at the plant. If the fire isn’t extinguished immediately, it will quickly spread, heating up the ammonium nitrate, making it become unstable and causing it to combust.”

“From their homes and offices, people might be able to see the smoke rising from the blaze, and when the shock wave of the blast reaches them, windows would explode, they would be hit by shards of glass, causing serious injuries and in some cases death. Following the blast, many buildings would be destroyed, and the economic damage would be immense. The explosion would also [literally] leave scorched earth and its results would cause long-term environmental damage.”

What could people do? Call the fire department?

“After the explosion at the Beirut port, the guidelines for firefighters were revised around the world and in Israel. In most instances, if they know it’s a fire involving ammonium nitrate, the directive is that they should usually stay 1.6 kilometers (about a mile) away from it.”

Meaning that there is nothing that can extinguish the fire?

“According to most of the accepted guidelines around the world, firefighters aren’t even supposed to get close and are supposed to wait until the fire goes out by itself, because the risk of explosion is too great. The Lebanese firefighters tried to fight the fire that broke out at the Beirut warehouse because they didn’t know there was ammonium nitrate there.

“They had no possibility of preventing the explosion and everyone at the site died. Not a trace of them remained. It’s possible that in the scenario I am describing, firefighters would try to warn members of the community near the plant so that they evacuate the area, but people are not prepared for that. It’s hard to imagine that within less than 20 minutes, it would be possible to manage to evacuate them – particularly if it's a community with elderly people and children.”

What should the government do?

“Evacuation and reconstruction [pinui-binui, in Hebrew] of plants that endanger communities. For such a step to be successful, the government must ensure that it’s economical, as they do with evacuation and construction of old houses [as part of urban renewal schemes] or when dealing with earthquake [preparedness] – providing benefits to reinforce buildings. We need a national plan. The problem is that in Israel, there’s bureaucracy and also the thinking that plants need to be in industrial zones situated near urban areas.”

The goal is simply to distance them.

“Yes. Today there’s no problem locating [chemical] plants at a distance of 5 to 10 kilometers from a city. There’s no problem with transportation. Around the world, they’re situating such plants at such distances from other population and industrial hubs. And then when there’s a fire, you only evacuate the workers from the plant, let’s say 100 people, and wait for it to be over; maybe it would even be possible to put it out. That’s simpler. You don’t need to evacuate an entire city.”

Don’t they grant benefits in Israel?

“No. The agencies that fund the [residential] evacuation and reconstruction schemes offer additional construction rights, tax exemptions from various fees and levies. On the other hand, plant managers who want to relocate their facilities would have to pay huge sums for the land [and] other charges. They would face bureaucratic obstacles and have to underwrite everything. These are obstacles that stand in the way of moving sources of risk away from residential areas. The state also needs to grant them land for free and government ministries must see to providing infrastructure such as roads, electricity, water and sewage systems.”

“Yes. The companies that would receive substantial tracts would be able to establish large plants there and maintain a distance between warehouses containing dangerous substances and residential places. Such facilities would have large areas for loading and unloading trucks, as is common among modern logistical systems, with parking for workers who come by car, etc. With the help of the sale of the land and the buildings at the old plant, it would be possible to fund a portion of the cost.”

What does the Environment Ministry do regarding this issue?

“It’s responsible for spearheading the process, and it must use its authority as the national supervisor of dangerous substances and direct agencies such as the Israel Land Authority and the planning administration at the Finance Ministry regarding steps they need to take to advance the process. The Environment Ministry also has the authority to direct such entities to locate [available] land and to prepare a national master plan or local plans.

“This would enable plants that are interested not to be worn down by the bureaucracy. Israel is notorious for the bureaucratic procedures that entrepreneurs need to go through to erect a plant. I also think the Environment Ministry should appoint a project 'czar' to deal with the subject.”

You talk about dangerous substances, but you’ve only mentioned ammonium nitrate.

“There are a lot of other such materials in Israel.”

But they don’t cause explosions?

“All kinds of things can happen, for example, there could be a cloud of poisonous gas. In a train accident near Dimona in 2016, bromine was released and the residents were instructed to remain in their homes. There was a nighttime lockdown on Dimona. Luckily, the wind didn’t blow the bromine into the direction of the city, so only a few people ended up being injured. Israel is the world’s largest producer of bromine, but the bromine plant is in the Negev, far from population areas. On the other hand, there are a lot of plants that have other dangerous substances.”

There is one example of a success story, in this realm: After a lengthy battle Haifa Chemicals was forced to empty its ammonia storage facility five years ago. It is important to note that ammonia is entirely different from ammonium nitrate, which is solid at room temperature and presents a danger when heated or mixed with flammable substances. Ammonia, on the other hand, is gaseous, and poisonous, at room temperature.

“Ammonia is flammable, but only when it's found in certain concentrations. The risk of fire is low. It’s mainly an issue of the gas being poisonous.”

Now, when there isn’t a storage facility in Haifa, how do they bring in ammonia?

“It’s imported and then it’s shipped in tanks transported on trucks. If there’s an accident in a populated area, it would be a problem.”

The Environment Ministry provided the following response to this article: “The conditions and requirements the Environment Ministry imposes on those entities dealing with ammonium nitrate are in keeping with the requirements accepted in European and OECD countries, including the types of substances, the threshold amounts for storage capacity, the manner of storage, protection requirements, etc. With regard to the ministry’s requirements regarding distance and separation [from populated areas], they are even stricter than what is customary in Europe and the [rest of the] world.

“Plants in Israel that have hazardous materials are subject to additional requirements, such as emergency procedures and safety and firefighting equipment designed to prevent an incident involving such materials. The ministry’s guiding policy principal is that the best way to protect the population from incidents involving dangerous substances is by maintaining a distance between fixed sources of risk and [the] public …. This principle is enforced with respect to plants with dangerous substances in general and plants dealing with ammonium nitrate in particular. It is not possible to release information regarding distribution of stored stockpiles of hazardous materials on a national basis for reasons of state security.”

The ministry further noted, in its statement, that the regulatory situation and recommendations relating to this issue have all been examined carefully on a national level with input from all the relevant government ministries and agencies.

'In this country the authorities don’t respect the public’s right to know the risks that we face. The population of communities where it is relevant know nothing about the size of the stores of ammonium nitrate at plants in their area.'

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