Oak Ridge builds $95 million lab

06/05/2009

By Candy McCampbell

Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Oak Ridge, Tenn., is getting a new $95 million Chemical and Materials Sciences laboratory to replace one built in the early 1950s.

The new lab started construction June 1, ahead of the original start date thanks to $60.6 million in American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funds announced in March. The remainder of the cost is from the federal budget.

McCarthy Building Companies Inc. of St. Louis, Mo., is construction contractor for the $64.5 million project and Cannon Design of New York is the architect and engineering firm.

About 120 to 150 workers will be on the job daily during peak construction.

The new lab, with 160,000 sq ft of office and lab space, will be built for LEED Gold certification and will house research on materials for batteries, solar panels and other energy-related products.

A three-story building, it will have 50 laboratories, 164 offices and 120 work stations and space for up to 300 researchers and staff.

“This new facility will be the ideal place to help the Department of Energy solve some of the most important energy challenges of the next decade,” Thom Mason, ORNL director, says in a statement. The ORNL is managed by a partnership between the University of Tennessee and Battelle for the U.S. Department of Energy.

The new lab will be across the road from the present labs, which are outdated and generate high energy and maintenance costs, officials said.

Updating aging facilities has been a part of ORNL’s Science Laboratories Infrastructure program.

Many Oak Ridge facilities “simply cannot support the requirements of our groundbreaking research,” according to Gerald Boyd, manager of the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge office.

Construction will be completed in 2011, almost a year ahead of the original schedule.

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