Pacific Northwest Site Office: Prepared for the next challenge

Scientific and engineering breakthroughs occur regularly. Although they’re not always front page news, with each major advancement we need to be positioned and ready for the next challenge. As an extension of the Department of Energy’s Office of Science, the Pacific Northwest Site Office provides stewardship to Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), and working in partnership with Battelle ensures the world’s most brilliant minds are supported with cutting-edge, energy friendly facilities, as well as state-of-the-art equipment, instrumentation and capabilities.

Our 10-year campus strategy, shows a need to average one new building a year to meet expected challenges and transform our campus for the needs of the future. Last summer, Deputy Secretary of Energy Elizabeth Sherwood Randal, Sen. Patty Murray and Congressman Dan Newhouse helped us dedicate the Systems Engineering Building, the most recent addition to PNNL. We are well under way in adding additional facilities, including a chemistry laboratory (to be completed this year), an office building (to be completed next year), and a multipurpose collaboration facility (in procurement). Together, these three new federal facilities will add more than 64,000 square feet to PNNL’s work space as we prepare to tackle the nation’s next and current needs. These facilities, and the others we are planning, will provide new capabilities and house ongoing needs in modern, efficient environments, enabling PNNL to keep up with developing science needs and maintaining safe, secure operations.

State of the art buildings are but one aspect of how we facilitate the continued advancement of research here at PNNL. Inside each are numerous and often extremely complex pieces of equipment that enable scientists and engineers to approach challenging questions with confidence. In 2015, PNNL added another such capability, called High Resolution Mass Accuracy Capability, or HRMAC for short. Containing a 21 Tesla magnet, the HRMAC is the world’s highest resolution mass spectrometer, which enables researchers and the global user community to address key challenges in biology, the environment, Earth systems and national security by giving researchers unprecedented clarity when observing molecules.

Facilities and equipment rely on the right expertise and talent to be productive. PNNL averages over 40 peer-reviewed publications, 2 patents and a technology license every two weeks. PNNL’s expertise drew nearly 5,000 external visits and users to the region last year alone

So as the other local DOE office tackles the tough challenges remaining from our past, PNSO is focused on PNNL and its role in support of our nation and community’s future. Ensuring with each step forward that we are well prepared for the next.

This story was originally published March 22, 2016 at 10:33 PM with the headline "Pacific Northwest Site Office: Prepared for the next challenge."