Author(s)

Kenneth Ray Olson¹, Lois Wright Morton²

¹Department of NRES, College of Agricultural, Consumer, and Environmental Sciences, University of Illinois, Urbana, IL, USA.
²Department of Sociology, College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, Iowa State University, Ames, IA, USA.

The soils, tropical climate, and network of canals and rivers of southern Vietnam have created one of the most diverse tropical jungles and intensely cultivated landscapes of Southeast Asia. This paradise has a long history of numerous wars, foreign occupations, and most recently the Second Indochina War (aka the Vietnam War 1965-1972) which defoliated rain forests and ancient wetland mangroves and left behind contaminated soil and sediment hotspots. During this war, the United States (US) military sprayed 80 million liters of Agent Orange contaminated with the dioxin TCDD in a guerrilla war against communist insurgents. Agent Orange was a synthetic plant growth regulator comprised of equal amounts of two herbicides 2,4-dichloro phenoxyacetic acid C₈H₆Cl₂O₃ (2,4-D) and 2,4,5-trichlorophenoxyacetic acid C₈H₅Cl₃O₃ (2,4,5-T). TCDD, the dioxin, 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzodioxin (C₁₂H₄Cl₄O₂) was an unintended byproduct of the accelerated combustion process used in the manufacture of herbicides containing 2,4,5-T. Agent Orange has frequently been blamed for soil and sediment contamination and long-term human health problems; however, the true source of harm is the dioxin TCDD. Agent Orange has a short half-life of days and weeks after application to vegetation, and has not been found to persist, after 50 years, in the water or soils of southern Vietnam. However, the half-life of dioxin TCDD depends on where it is deposited and varies from 1 to 3 years on soil surfaces that have been fully exposed to sunlight, to as long as 20 to 50 years or more when buried in tropical subsoils, and more than 100 years in river and sea sediments. Dioxin TCDD was heavily concentrated in the US Air Force bases in Vietnam where the herbicides were stored, loaded on planes and helicopters for aerial spraying, and used extensively around military base perimeter fences as a security measure to prevent surprise attacks. Bien Hoa Air Force base, 40 km northeast of Ho Chi Minh City, continues to be one of the mega-hotspots where after 48 years the dioxin TCDD levels in fish and shrimp are still high and fishing is banned in ponds and lakes adjacent to the airbase. Although expensive, one of the most effective remediation to dioxin TCDD contaminated soils is incineration which is the recommended method of dioxin TCDD disposal.

Soils of Vietnam, Agent Orange, Dioxin, TCDD, Herbicides, Soil Contaminant, Sediment Contaminant, Half-Life, Hotspots, Operation Ranch Hand, US Airbases in Vietnam, Vietnam War, Cu Chi Soil Tunnels, Guerilla Warfare, Incineration

Olson, K. and Morton, L. (2019) Long-Term Fate of Agent Orange and Dioxin TCDD Contaminated Soils and Sediments in Vietnam Hotspots. Open Journal of Soil Science, 9, 1-34. doi: 10.4236/ojss.2019.91001.