WV Congress members quiet, advocates loud on Trump aim to ax Chemical Safety Board

In its proposed fiscal year 2026 budget, the Trump administration plans to zero out the budget of the U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board, indicating a Sept. 30, 2026, deadline for “closure of the Board.�

West Virginia was the focus of more completed CSB investigations since 2006 than any other state except Texas — seven — at the time of the agency’s most recent finish to a West Virginia-focused probe, which yielded a 2023 finding that two Kanawha County companies’ safety failures enabled a fatal 2020 explosion at a Belle chemical facility.

The incidents investigated by CSB resulted in 14 deaths, 16 injuries and, in the case of Freedom Industries’ 2014 chemical leak into the Elk River, contaminated water supply for 300,000 people.

“CSB will be needed until there are no more chemical disasters,� said Maya Nye, a St. Albans native and federal policy director for Coming Clean, a chemical industry-focused environmental health nonprofit.

Kanawha County residents don’t have to look far to find the inspiration for Congress creating the agency via the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990.

The release of highly toxic methyl isocyanate at a site operated by prominent Kanawha County chemical manufacturer Union Carbide Corp. in Bhopal, India in 1984 immediately killed some 3,800 people and caused exposures that left many thousands more dead, with an additional 100,000 people reporting associated illnesses years after.

Chemical companies and government agencies focused on efforts to lower process safety risks, which led to CSB’s creation.

Since then, CSB has deployed to more than 170 chemical incidents and issued over 1,000 recommendations that have prompted safety enhancements.

In West Virginia, post-incident recommendations CSB has recorded as followed include:

• American Water Works Company Inc., parent company of West Virginia American Water, requiring all American Water state utilities’ surface water treatment plants to develop a plan to respond to contamination from all chemicals in a vulnerable source water protection area that can’t be treated — after CSB found West Virginia American Water wrongly assumed its water treatment and filtration system could treat and remove chemicals from water contaminated by the 2014 Elk River spill.
• Chemical manufacturer Optima Belle LLC developing and implementing programs for process design, equipment selection, and hazards evaluation and management — after the CSB found its safety failures partially enabled a fatal 2020 explosion at its Belle chemical facility
• A panel of the American Chemistry Council, a chemical industry trade group, revising its safety manual for phosgene after a release of the highly toxic gas left a worker at a DuPont Corp. chemical manufacturing plant dead in 2010

The CSB’s budget is $14 million, amounting to $15 for each one of the 903,100 workers in the U.S. chemical manufacturing industry estimated by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The CSB’s budget is 0.008% of the $175 billion the Republican-majority Congress allotted for immigration and border enforcement in the sprawling budget reconciliation package President Donald Trump signed into law on July 4.

It’s up to Congress to finalize the federal budget.

All four members of West Virginia’s congressional delegation — Sens. Shelley Moore Capito and Jim Justice and Reps. Carol Miller and Riley Moore, all Republicans — vocally supported the budget reconciliation legislation.

But none expressed support for saving the CSB from elimination when asked for comment on the Trump administration’s budget proposal.

Kelley Moore, spokeswoman for Capito, said her office doesn’t weigh in as Appropriations Committee members consider the issues.

Spokespeople for Justice, Miller and Moore did not respond to requests for comment.

“What’s next? Gutting the National Transportation Safety Board?� Nye said, referring to the federal agency that investigates aviation and surface transportation incidents. “I, for one, feel safer in a plane thousands of feet above the earth knowing that the airline industry and regulators learn from past mistakes that NTSB identifies. It’s no different with chemical disasters and the CSB.�

The American Chemistry Council, one of the nation’s largest industry trade associations, joined the American Chemical Society, and the American Institute of Chemical Engineers in addressing a July 3 letter to Senate and House of Representatives appropriations leaders urging “robust funding� for the CSB.

The American Chemical Society and American Institute of Chemical Engineers represent over 200,000 chemists, chemical engineers and other chemistry professionals combined.

“Together, we are strongly committed to advancing safety throughout the chemical industry and view the CSB as an essential partner in achieving this mission,� the groups said.

W.Va.'s severe chemical industry injury rate is high

There’s evidence that chemical industry jobs are less safe in West Virginia than throughout the country.

West Virginia’s per capita rates of severe injury reports, workers hospitalized and workers with amputations in the chemical industry recorded from 2015 through 2024 all far exceeded the national rates, according to federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration data.

West Virginia’s 17 severe injury reports recorded among chemical industry workers in that span more than quintupled the national rate per 100,000 people.

West Virginia’s 12 chemical industry workers hospitalized constituted a per capita rate per 100,000 people more than quadruple the national rate in those 10 years.

The state’s six chemical industry workers with amputations comprised a rate per 100,000 people nearly seven times the national rate.

How CSB head says agency pays for itself

In a video the CSB published last month, CSB Chairperson Steve Owens touted the work of the agency.

“If the CSB’s many safety lessons have prevented at least one catastrophic chemical incident, the money saved by protecting lives, preventing serious injuries and damage to facilities, safeguarding surrounding communities, and avoiding costly litigation and legal settlements far exceeds the CSB’s modest annual budget,� Owens said. “The CSB more than pays for itself in costs saved by preventing serious chemical incidents.�

But the CSB fiscal year 2026 budget request notes Trump’s budget plan proposes $0 for the agency, with the expectation that CSB begins closing down during fiscal year 2025.

CSB’s emergency fund of $844,145 would be appropriated to cover costs associated with closing down the agency.

The budget request summary claims the CSB “duplicates substantial capabilities� the OSHA and Environmental Protection Agency have to investigate “chemical-related mishaps� and notes the CSB doesn’t have enforcement power.

Policy recommendations, the document says, should come from agencies that have authority to issue regulations.

CSB investigations and recommendations were halted in Trump’s first term by him not choosing new members after previous members resigned following his 2019 appointment of Katherine Lemos, who had been an executive at aerospace manufacturer Northrop Grunman, to the board.

A July 2020 federal inspector general’s audit found one board member trying to take on the work of five made the agency less productive in its responsibilities of accident reconstruction, safety engineering, human factor identification, toxicology reviews and air pollution regulation assessments.

“Having a quorum of one, even if permissible, impairs the [board] mission for reasons of both workload management and separation of duties,� the report stated.

The CSB didn’t release any final investigation reports from December 2019 to May 2021. But since May 2021, the CSB has released 24 such reports. The agency had a backlog of 18 unfinished investigations dating to 2016 in early 2021.

Trump also proposed zeroing out the CSB’s budget in his first term. But the current GOP-majority Congress has shown more willingness to back Trump’s plans for deep cuts across the federal workforce.

'An independent eye' could be shut 

Advocates hope Congress prioritizes chemical safety enough to preserve the agency that uses independent investigations to protect workers and the environment nationwide – and especially in communities like Chemical Valley.

"Tell Congress that the Chemical Safety Board is essential," Melody Reis, federal policy director at Moms Clean Air Force, a national air quality advocacy nonprofit, urged in an email to supporters Thursday.

“CSB," Nye said, "has been an independent eye that is crucial in helping regulators and industry understand how chemical disasters happen, why loved ones died and how to prevent similar incidents from occurring in the future.�