Army Department February 8, 2006 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

The U.S. Army announces its intent to prepare an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) to evaluate the construction and operation of new USAMRIID facilities and the decommissioning and demolition or reuse of existing USAMRIID facilities at Fort Detrick. This EIS is being prepared and considered in accordance with requirements of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) of 1969, regulations of the President's Council on Environmental Quality (40 CFR parts 1500-1508), and the Army's implementation of NEPA (32 CFR part 651), 29 March 2002. The proposed new USAMRIID facilities will provide biocontainment laboratory space, animal facilities, and administrative offices, as well as operational and administrative support facilities. These new facilities will be located adjacent to the existing USAMRIID facilities within the National Interagency Biodefense Campus on Area A of Fort Detrick and near the biomedical research facilities of mission partners, including the Agricultural Research Service Foreign Disease Weed Research Unit of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the planned National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases' Integrated Research Facility, and the Department of Homeland Security's National Biodefense Analysis and Countermeasures Center. The existing USAMRIID facilities on Area A will be decommissioned and either demolished or reused following occupancy of the new USAMRIID facilities. The construction will occur in two stages. Stage 1 will provide approximately 700,000 gross square feet (gsf) of new building space for the replacement of outdated and compressed existing USAMRIID facilities in order to sustain the current mission and to expand medical testing and evaluation (T&E) capacity in support of immediate Department of Defense (DoD) and national demand. Stage 2 will encompass approximately 400,000 gsf of new building space for the balance of USAMRIID's expanded mission and for additional capacity to meet intensified national requirements for medical test and evaluation in support of biodefense research as well as to accommodate increased collaborative efforts among USAMRIID's mission partners. In addition, approximately 200,000 gsf of the existing USAMRIID facilities may be renovated and reused for laboratory or non-laboratory use, to be determined by evolving biodefense requirements.