Jerry Petersen
JE Dunn Construction and SmithGroup, which worked with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory a decade ago for the construction of its Energy Systems Integration Facility, has once again partnered with the Department of Energy organization to design and build the Energy Materials and Processing at Scale laboratory.
EMAP will, like ESIF, be situated at the South Table Mountain Campus in Golden, Colorado, and will house research capabilities meant to bring about materials and process innovations in numerous fields, including advanced manufacturing, energy storage, net-zero chemicals and industrial decarbonization, NREL said Tuesday.
Design work on the $224 million project is already in progress, with groundbreaking set to take place later this year. EMAPS is expected to feature a sustainable, high-performance design that will result in a LEED Gold certification at minimum.
Work is being done under the Cooperative Construction Contracting Approach vehicle, of which JE Dunn is a recipient. The CCCA is meant to help NREL expedite the contracting process for large construction projects.
JE Dunn Project Director Charlie Slattery expressed eagerness to work on the EMAP project to provide NREL “another transformative facility” while NREL Director Martin Keller looked forward to “another successful partnership with JE Dunn and SmithGroup.”
For his part, SmithGroup Design Director Mark Kranz said the new EMAPS facility “creates new physical and functional connections that will advance NREL’s research capabilities.”
