Observer Reporter
Thursday, May 11, 2006

SDGroup opens doors to renovated former Curry Home

WAYNESBURG, PA - May 10, 2006 - The red ribbon across the newly painted railing at the former Curry Home was cut Wednesday, welcoming the community to Separation Design Group's new home.

SDGroup is "recycling" the former county nursing home, renovating it to accommodate their high technology research and product development work. Greene County commissioners and other local officials participated in the event, which included a tour of the building.

Other speakers included Patrick Stewart, president of the Idea Foundry in Pittsburgh and former CIO of Weirton Steel, and David Palmer, chief operating officer at Pittsburgh Life Sciences Greenhouse. They were enthusiastic about the advances SDGroup's technology will bring in the medical and industrial areas, and the potential for new jobs in Greene County.

"We review hundreds of projects at the Idea Foundry, and this is one of the five best we have ever seen," Stewart said. SDGroup is working with both these organizations to commercialize products based on their ultra-rapid cycle molecular separations technology.

SDGroup finalized a lease to buy agreement with Greene County officials in November 2005 and immediately began work on the building. Mold and asbestos mitigation and roof repairs were completed by the end of 2005. The company has substantially completed their upgrade of one floor of one wing of the 57,000 sq. ft. building, installing a security system and a new boiler, replacing floor and ceiling tiles, and painting all the walls. Work outside includes planting flowers and pruning apple trees, as well as repair and painting of the front canopy and columns.

"Our business is all about energy efficiency and responsible use of resources" said Doug Galbraith, SDGroup general manager. "We were very pleased to find that the existing building was still in pretty good shape, including the plumbing and heating systems.
It took a lot of work on the part of everyone here at SDGroup, but it is definitely worth it. We have already begun rehabilitating the second floor." Future plans include developing the center portion of the building as a high tech conference center.

"This is a perfect building for us", Galbraith said. "We now have the space to set up separate rooms for our analytic and test equipment. This allows us to have more than one project running at a time. It will also allow us to hire more researchers and technicians as our research continues to develop."

SDGroup is developing a modular gas separations technology and has received over $850,000 in research grants through the SBIR/STTR program. This technology has multiple applications in industry, health care, energy, water treatment, and other areas. Current work, in conjunction with Waynesburg College, includes the development of a lightweight portable medical oxygen concentrator, funded in part by the National Institutes of Health. The National Science Foundation is supporting their development of a modular oxygen concentrator that will improve combustion efficiency for industries such as glass and metals fabrication.