The opening of the Postle Hall, the College of Dentistry building, will be delayed for five months due to piping issues. Credit: Jack Westerheide | Former Photo Editor
The Master Planning and Facilities Committee announced a five-month delay to the completion of renovations to the College of Dentistry’s Postle Hall Tuesday and approved the capital investment plan for the fiscal year of 2021.
A renovation of Postle Hall is delayed due to a “major engineering design error” in the piping for dental suctions, Mark Conselyea, associate vice president of facilities operations and development, said. The $95 million project will replace the eastern side of Postle Hall and renovate and upgrade the western portion, providing an additional 128,000 square feet of teaching space and a central sterilization service to the College of Dentistry.
The piping is currently being removed and replaced properly, which Conselyea said has restricted progress on other aspects of the building’s construction. The renovation and construction of Postle Hall was originally slated for completion by July but is now projected for December, Conselyea said.
The board also approved the capital investment plan for the fiscal year of 2021. The plan includes utility system capital improvement projects in partnership with Ohio State Energy Partners including expansion and extension projects, energy conservation measure projects and life-cycle renovations, repairs and replacement projects, which improve existing utility plants and piping on campus. The cost of the utility system capital improvement projects totals $66.36 million.
Among the projects approved was the installation of a $5.57 million heat recovery chiller to the existing South Campus Central Chiller Plant. Scott Potter, senior director of comprehensive energy management, said that the chiller would supply hot water to the James Cancer Hospital, Harding Hospital, Parks Hall, Riffe Hall and the Biological Sciences Building.
“It’s likely that over the 50-year course of this energy concession agreement, no single project will have a bigger impact on the university’s efficiency,” Potter said. “Typically a single building or a single energy project may have a 0.2 percent or 0.3 percent impact on university efficiency. This project we expect will improve our efficiency by 2 percent alone.”
The Board also approved $190,000 for the design of replacement electrical equipment and $2.23 million for structural upgrades to the McCracken Power Plant.
The full Board will vote on the resolutions approved by the committee Thursday.
