HANOVER — The federal Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory is planning to build a $4.8 million “climatic chamber building” which can create below-freezing temperatures year-round.
The 3,800-square-foot facility in Hanover will include a “cold chamber with a staging area for vehicle access,” an office, storage space and restrooms and showers, according to a news release for a groundbreaking ceremony to be held on Friday.
The facility will be able to create temperatures as low as minus 58 Fahrenheit and will allow for tests including how a truck might perform in the Arctic or how long concrete mixtures take to harden in such temperatures.
“The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers must be able to construct things in any temperature on this planet, so we test various methods at the laboratory,” CRREL campus manager Terry Harwood said in the news release.
CRREL, located on Route 10 north of downtown Hanover, is part of the U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center. Design and contract procurement costs for the building totaled some $900,000, and construction, by P&S Construction Inc. of North Chelmsford, Mass., is slated to cost $3.9 million.
Construction is expected to start next month and includes demolishing an existing concrete pad.
Correction
The groundbreaking for construction of a new cold-weather climatic chamber at the Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory in Hanover is scheduled for Friday. An earlier version of this story gave the wrong date.