Biodefense lab in North Carolina? Forget it.

RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, N.C. – That giant sucking sound you may have heard Wednesday was the air leaving the balloon of efforts to land the $450 million National Bio- and Agro-Defense Lab for North Carolina.

As more and more local politicians have joined opponents of the proposed lab that would be built in Butner, the folks in Washington, D.C. are reacting – and not favorably.

"Your message has been received and the message has been that you don't support us coming here," Department of Homeland Security’s Science & Technology spokesman John Verrico told WRAL TV’s Beau Minnick.

Congressman Brad Miller and the Raleigh City Council are the latest to join the anti-NBAD chorus.

Even Warwick Arden, a big advocate of the project and dean of the College of Veterinary Medicine at NCSU, conceded to Minnick that Homeland Security hasn’t answered questions raised about the environmental risks of the plant.

Five other states, meanwhile, seem determined to win the project.

As for North Carolina, the bet from The Skinny is that Butner is no longer in the running.

One of the best chances to secure the lab fell apart this week when the North Carolina Biotechnology Center rejected a grant from Golden LEAF. The $262,000 involved would have paid for efforts by the Biotech Center and its NBAD allies to prepare an education campaign about the lab. The Biotech center said Golden LEAF’s terms for the grant were unreasonable. Golden LEAF countered by saying it needed to ensure any promotional campaign was factual.

It’s clear that lab supporters underestimated the furor the lab project would create.

It’s equally clear that Homeland Security has a tin ear when it comes to public scrutiny. Not answering people’s questions only feeds the fears that the NBAD project has something to hide.

North Carolina will likely lose out on this project now. If so, it’s a major defeat for the state’s biotechnology sector, which stood to gain from research and development dollars the lab would bring to the state.