Construction to start at R&D site

LIMA - The city will begin preparations for a new advanced energy research and development center this July, Mayor David Berger said Tuesday.

Berger announced the news during a City Focus meeting with Northside Neighborhood Association.

The city has planned the center for years at a triangle of land at South Main and Fourth streets near the planned site of Global Energy. The city has acquired the 44 parcels it needs for the site and has vacated the small stretches of Third and Lafayette streets for the project.

The city is doing the property purchases and site preparation work with a 2006 $3.3 million state development grant.

The city's plan has been to link the center to Global Energy's planned electricity and synthetic natural gas plant, including using some of its byproducts for other new uses.

The federal government just opened its rules for clean-coal funding, Berger said. During the Bush and now Obama administrations, the government allocated billions of dollars for clean coal but spent none of it.

Applications for the grants are due in early August and the city is assisting Global with its submission, Berger said.

At the meeting, in which Berger holds with his administrative staff several times a year, each time at a different location in the city, residents asked about drug houses, drivers speeding and railroad tracks in poor condition.