Due to a series of unfortunate coincidences, including a 100-year rain, one-third of the Southern Research Institute’s Frederick, MD facility’s roof collapsed, destroying and flooding the mechanical equipment room and A/BSL-3 labs. Summer Consultants provided mechanical, electrical and plumbing design for the restoration and repair of the damaged lab space and mechanical room.
The spaces were completely renovated with new flooring, ceilings, and walls as well as new finishes, casework, lighting and equipment. New air handlers feature fan arrays to provide redundancy and an optimized run-around heat recovery loop between the exhaust and supply systems. The exhaust fans are centrifugal fans with shooter stacks. Manual balancing valves were located in the mechanical equipment room for ease of annual balancing. Reheat coils and humidifiers were also located in the mechanical room to provide maintenance access outside the A/BSL-3 containment.
Additional features included a new contained laboratory waste system with HEPA vent filter and protected trench drains, plumbing for eye wash stations and emergency and containment showers. The new domestic water heating system included an electric instantaneous water heater and N+1 redundant thermostatic mixing valves for both the laboratory and public use rest rooms.