Industry News

St. Luke's Hospital, an affiliate of Sutter Health System, is constructing a $6.4-million heart center featuring a cardiac catheterization lab. The center, which will also house equipment for non-invasive diagnostic procedures such as echocardiograms and stress tests, is expected to open in spring of 2003.

Better Choice Packaging, a packaging and display company serving companies including Hershey, Arm & Hammer, and Bath & Body Works, will relocate operations from a 26,000-sf Camden facility to a newly purchased 50,300-sf, $640,000 facility sited on four acres in Camden, N.J.

Lawrence Livermore Laboratory has received approval from the federal government to build a laboratory for the study of potential biological weapons in Livermore, Calif. Rated Biosafety Level 3 (BSL-3), the lab will enable research in the detection of potential threats including anthrax, botulism, and other diseases. In planning the facility, the National Nuclear Security Administration reviewed 92 public comments and, as a result, incorporated 33 changes to the planned facility.

The City of Poway broke ground on a 5,900-sf council chamber building and a two-story 50,400-sf City Hall office building in October 2002. The $14.6-million project was designed by McGraw/Baldwin Architects. Douglas E. Barnhart Inc. is providing construction management services.

San Antonio-based Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) has completed a 5,000-sf fuel contamination research and testing laboratory. The facility houses over 4,200-sf of lab space and 12 automated test cells, one dedicated to hybrid fuel cell testing, two to diesel, and nine to gasoline, enabling a greater flexibility in the number of systems and components that can be tested at one time.