Idaho Accelerator project gets new funding

Local officials said an additional $400,000 in funding for the Idaho Accelerator Center will turn ISU into the premier university for accelerator research in the world. They said it could also jump-start a technology corridor and help create loads of jobs.

By Sean Ellis — Journal Writer

Gov. Dirk Kempthorne announced Wednesday his office would provide the Idaho Accelerator Center money to help fund construction of the IAC’s Business Development Facility at Alvin Ricken Drive on the Idaho State University campus.

“… Here’s a chance with a few hundred thousand dollars to make Idaho State University the premier accelerator research facility in the nation,” said Mayor Roger Chase.

Accelerators are machines that can speed up molecules, sub-atomic particles and elementary particles such as electrons and protons. They are used for scientific and applied research, as well as for development of a variety of high-tech industrial applications.

After construction, the business facility is expected to create 20 to 30 new jobs, Kempthorne said.

The money will be used to construct two accelerator laboratories that will enable private industry to access nuclear science and radiation technologies at the facility.

Frank Harmon, director of the IAC, said the facility has been involved with several private sector entities, including Positron Systems Inc., which will become the facility’s first private tenant next week.

Bannock Development Corp. Executive Director Ray Burstedt said the facility provides enormous potential to create more jobs and expand a technology corridor which economic developers from Pocatello to Rexburg have touted for several years.

“Positron is just one of many opportunities we see to develop an industry cluster around the accelerator center,” he said. “This creates a huge anchor in the southern tip of the technology corridor that the rest of the corridor can grow from. That provides tremendous opportunities for Pocatello.”

Burstedt said the jobs created would pay in the $75,000-per-year range.

Harmon said he wouldn’t speculate how many jobs could be created as a result of the center. “The sky’s the limit,” he said.

Harmon said one of the most promising capabilities of ISU’s accelerators is in developing technologies that could be used for homeland security, such as detecting explosives and nuclear material. The center is currently researching ways to defeat chemical and biological weapons using intense bursts of radiation.

“This is what started the Silicon Valley with an accelerator at Stanford many years ago,” Chase said. “We think this has great potential for spinoff.”

Blake Hall, president of the state Board of Education, said the expansion will “help create educational opportunities for our students here in Idaho that are available nowhere else in America and at the same time, bind that together with economic development, so we can spin off entities that can provide jobs for these students…”

The governor’s office received the funds from the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory settlement fund, which was established by the Department of Energy in 1995 to stimulate east Idaho’s economy.

The IAC received $1 million for other expansion projects in September and university officials expect another $400,000 soon from another source.

The IAC includes 21,000 square feet of laboratory space in three laboratories on ISU’s campus. It has more operating accelerators than any other university in North America.

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