Media Advisory

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill officials have invited neighbors and others to a briefing tonight (April 28) about the status of clean-up efforts at the Airport Road waste disposal area located on UNC property. The briefing will be held at 7 p.m. in the Windflower Room of the William and Ida Friday Continuing Education Center.

Peter Reinhardt, director of the university’s Department of Environment, Health and Safety, and representatives from ARCADIS Inc., the university’s consultant, will provide the update. Both UNC and ARCADIS signed an administrative agreement in 2004 as part of a voluntary clean-up program for the 0.2-acre site with the N.C. Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR). (For details, go to http://www.unc.edu/news/archives/nov03/denr111903.html.)

UNC used the site between 1973 and 1979 to bury laboratory chemical waste generated by the campus and what then was N.C. Memorial Hospital using legally accepted practices of that era. DENR ranked it 218^th among the state’s 443 inactive waste sites as of October 2004. The site does not appear on the Environmental Protection Agency’s Superfund national priority list.

University officials last week invited citizens from neighborhoods near the waste site, other interested citizens and local officials to attend the briefing. Attendees will have an opportunity to ask questions following the university’s presentation.

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Contact: Mike McFarland, (919) 962-8593