A task force trying to ensure that the underground Red Hill Fuel Storage Facility does not contaminate an aquifer that supplies one-fourth of urban Honolulu’s drinking water identifies the crux of the problem: The Navy reacts to leaks after they occur, once fuel has tainted the surrounding environment.

That’s why installing extra protections at the aging facility is so important, as a recent draft report emphasizes. Secondary containment, such as double-lining operational tanks, would capture fuel that leaks through the inner wall and real-time leak detection would alert staff on site, who could act before the leak potentially worsens and bleeds through the outer wall into the ground.

Navy officials take issue with the preliminary report issued by the Red Hill Fuel Storage Facility Task Force, especially the recommendation that the Navy should complete the upgrades within the next 10 years or shut down the facility, which supplies fuel to aircraft and ships at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam.

The state Legislature formed the task force — which consists of city, state, military and community leaders — after the Navy reported that about 27,000 gallons of fuel had leaked in January from the World War II-era facility, which sits 100 feet above one of Oahu’s major aquifers. Tests to date have shown no harmful levels of contamination in groundwater.

The draft report firmly states that Red Hill’s operations should continue only "on the condition that the aging facility be upgraded with secondary containment and state-of-the-art leak detection to ensure safe operations … " and that the upgrades should be complete by Dec. 31, 2024.

But Navy officials assert that those recommendations are not feasible, that the draft did not include enough input from the military branch and that it was not shared with the Navy before being released to the public. Navy officials are working with a task force subcommittee to revise the draft. The full task force’s next meeting is Dec. 11; it must submit its final report within 20 days of the beginning of the 2015 legislative session.

Tom Clements, environmental public affairs officer for Navy Region Hawaii Public Affairs, said the Navy’s dual goal is to preserve the safety of Oahu’s water supply and the availability of a secure, vital military fuel supply. Each of Red Hill’s underground tanks is 200 feet tall and 100 feet around, encased in concrete and basalt rock. The Navy has not even identified an existing technology that could be used to install an effective secondary containment system at the unique Red Hill system, making any discussion of the timeline for upgrades premature, he said. Assuming that suitable technology is found, funding for it would be substantial and is not yet available.

Those are significant challenges, to be sure. Still, the risks of failing to find a solution are potentially catastrophic for hundreds of thousands of Oahu residents who depend on the aquifer for their drinking water. It is the Navy’s urgent responsibility to explore every possible innovation to improve the safety of a facility that has a history of fuel leaks dating back to 1949.

As the draft report states, "Ultimately, the storage of 187 million gallons of fuel, 100 feet above a drinking water resource, is inherently dangerous to the environment." Even if this draft gets watered down in revisions before the final report is submitted to the Legislature, there is no diluting that bedrock fact.

Secondary containment and real- time leak detection are necessary to mitigate the risks of this 75-year-old underground fuel-storage system, and the clock for installing those protections needs to start ticking.