Wyoming Lot Owners to Finally Remove Asbestos
July 18th, 2008
Residents living between Lupe and Four Mile road near Cheyenne in Wyoming can finally breathe easy: the asbestos-contaminated waste that has been sitting on a nearby lot for almost two years has finally been hauled away. The lot, which is contained within a residential district, was used for several years for dumping construction debris.
Asbestos fragments were discovered on the site in 2006, but authorities have spent the last two years debating over whether the asbestos contamination was a health risk, and whether the asbestos could potentially become airborne and contaminate surrounding areas.
In December 2006, the Environmental Protection Agency assessed the site, and stated that the asbestos was not friable, and therefore was not a health risk.
Friable asbestos is old and crumbles easily with hand pressure, meaning its fibers can become airborne. Non-friable asbestos is still intact and in good condition and won’t deteriorate or crumble easily.
Despite the EPA reports, however, the Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality, and an expert hired by locals, both found evidence that friable asbestos was present on the site when they carried out investigations.
Following the discovery of the friable asbestos, local authorities requested a written plan to determine how removal and disposal of the asbestos would be carried out.
An asbestos contractor was subsequently hired to supervise the clean-up of the site. A total of 560 pounds of asbestos debris was removed from the vacant lot in October 2007, and a further 60 pounds was removed on Wednesday June 25. A small amount of construction debris—around five pounds—was discovered and removed from neighboring residential properties.
The waste is being removed from the site via covered trucks, and is being taken to a landfill which is equipped and licensed to deal with asbestos waste.
The job is not quite over yet, despite the fact that more than 600 pounds of asbestos-contaminated material has so far been removed. The final phase of the clean-up process will see a further forty truckloads of material removed from the site, and is expected to take around three days. However, the final phase cannot be completed for several more weeks due to scheduling issues.
