US commits additional $73 mln for dioxin remediation at Vietnam air base

The U.S. on Tuesday announced a new contract worth $73 million to treat and clean soil at the former Bien Hoa air base in southern Vietnam's Dong Nai province.

The U.S. Agency for International Development’s administrator Samantha Power, U.S. Ambassador to Vietnam Marc Knapper, and Vietnamese Vice Minister of National Defense Senior Lieutenant General Hoang Xuan Chien jointly proclaimed the new program in Dong Nai bordering Ho Chi Minh City.

“This program is a reflection of the United States’ enduring commitment to Vietnam as the countries mark 10 years of the U.S.-Vietnam Comprehensive Partnership,” the U.S. Consulate General in HCMC stated in a release.

Under the new contract, Nelson Environmental Remediation USA, an American small business, will design and build a treatment facility to decontaminate soil and sediment on and around the former air base.

The first phase will treat more than 100,000 cubic meters of almost 500,000 cubic meters of dioxin-contaminated soil and sediment.

The Bien Hoa clean-up project was launched in April 2019 and is expected to take 10 years to complete and cost up to $450 million. The U.S. government’s contribution to date to the Bien Hoa clean-up is $163.25 million, out of a total expected contribution of $300 million.

The Bien Hoa clean-up is nearly four times the volume of a previous Danang Airport clean-up project, which the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and Vietnam’s Ministry of National Defense completed in 2018.

In December 2022, USAID began a $29 million program with Vietnamese firm VINA E&C to complete critical preparatory work at the former Bien Hoa air base. This contract is the largest ever from USAID’s Mission in Vietnam to a local organization.