The U.S. Senate recently approved legislation that would extend existing chemical security standards for one more year.

The Senate voted 84-6 on July 9 to include a provision in the fiscal year 2010 appropriations bill to extend the Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Standards (CFATS), which is set to expire in three months.

“As we have argued for the past several months, Congress needs to address the October 2009 CFATS deadline expeditiously,” said Bill Allmond, vice president of Government Relations and ChemStewards®.

The Senate action comes on the heels of a public announcement at the Chemical Sector Security Summit earlier this month when a senior staffer for Sen. Joseph Lieberman, chair of the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee, stated that reauthorization of CFATS was unlikely this year.

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