UNC report finds lead in nearly 56% of buildings on campus
After almost a year of work, UNC-Chapel Hill has tested every single water fixture on its campus for lead.
More than half of the buildings tested had at least one water fixture with detectable lead. While the testing is over, there's more work to do.
The hunt for lead in water on UNC's campus began at Wilson Library after high school summer interns found it in drinking fountains. Now, almost nine months later, the university has finished its campus wide initiative.
From residence halls, to libraries, to Kenan Stadium, UNC's extensive water testing found lead in fixtures across campus.
After nine months of work, of the 262 buildings tested, 149 had at least one fixture with detectable lead, that's almost 56 percent.
Vice Chancellor for Institutional Integrity and Risk Management George Battle said while testing is complete, the work on this issue is ongoing.
"We started remediation of those fixtures where we found lead during the testing so that process continues," Battle said.
UNC also now has a plan to test fixtures in buildings pre-dating 2014 every three years, starting next year.
"Some fixtures we will test next year, some we will test three years out," Battle said. "We'll stagger that to make sure we capture that and we're not in a situation similar to where we were this time where we were testing every building."
Battle added that UNC had no legal obligation to test all of the fixtures, because the university is not under certain regulations related to lead in water.
Battle believes this effort shows the work the university will do for safety.
"I'm confident that at this point, we certainly can say all of our drinking water sources on campus are lead free," Battle said.
UNC also offered free blood testing to students, faculty, and staff during the process. All 200 people tested had normal results.
