Fentanyl: How Can We Clean it Up? Webinar
About the Webinar
Originally presented April 12, 2023
Illicit fentanyl activities can lead to complex contamination incidents and create exposure risks to law enforcement, emergency responders, remediation contractors, and the public. This webinar will provide an overview of research to assist local and state entities requesting technical support for fentanyl remediation responses across the country. The presentation contains results from research initiated to fill select knowledge gaps that were identified during the development of EPA’s Fentanyl Fact Sheet for On-Scene Coordinators: Fentanyl and Fentanyl Analogues (2018). Decontamination operations will benefit from in situ degradation options for fentanyl and its analogues on building materials. EPA’s research efforts have produced data on the efficacy of several decontamination options for building materials as well as protective gear and personal protective equipment. These data include results from bench-scale decontamination tests under real-world conditions and the information has been used to successfully remediate fentanyl contaminated sites.
About the Presenter
Dr. Lukas Oudejans is a Research Physical Scientist with ORD’s Center for Environmental Solutions and Emergency Response. Over the past 14 years, he has gained vast experience in homeland security programs related to research, development and evaluation of innovative technologies for the decontamination of materials contaminated with chemical or biological agents. He is a co-author of EPA’s Fentanyl Fact Sheet for U.S. EPA Federal On-Scene Coordinators who are providing technical advice to state and local responders who may encounter environmental contamination from the fentanyl class of synthetic opioids (including fentanyl analogs). Currently, he is leading research efforts to assess decontamination options for fentanyl contaminated building materials and approaches for effective decontamination of contaminated PPE. Dr. Oudejans holds a Ph.D. in Experimental Physics from Radboud University, Nijmegen, The Netherlands (1994).