Georgia Public Health Laboratory

This replacement regional BSL-3+ laboratory facility functions as a back-up to facilities located in Albany and Decatur, Georgia, as well as performs the workload of the previous regional laboratory. The building houses four separate laboratory suites with different functions: CT (Chemical Terrorism) Suite, BT (Biological Terrorism) Suite, Training and Production Laboratories, and Surge Laboratories. All exhaust from the laboratories is HEPA filtered and each laboratory suite has its own dedicated HEPA filter bank. The entire facility is served by emergency power and redundancy is provided for all major mechanical equipment. The effluent waste from the laboratories passes through an effluent decontamination system. The laboratory waste piping is double-wall for secondary containment, and the piping in the BT Suite is provided with leak detection. The facility includes several provisions to prevent a terrorist attack on, or tampering with, the building or building systems, laboratory production space, a mail screening area, an “unknowns” room for examination of potentially hazardous deliveries, a training classroom, a training laboratory, offices, and conference room space.