Portsmouth Prepares Unique Building With Over 100 Laboratories for Demolition

The X-710 Technical Services Building has been iconic to the Portsmouth Site since the 1950s. Deactivation work is underway to prepare the building for demolition.

PIKETON, Ohio — Crews at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Portsmouth Site are deactivating a unique facility that once housed more than 100 specialized laboratories, part of a broader plan to shrink the legacy footprint to enable long‑term economic growth, community revitalization and high‑quality jobs for American workers.

The X-710 Technical Services Building has been an iconic part of the Portsmouth Site since the 1950s. Although most occupants vacated the building five years ago, chemicals and materials inside the facility need to be characterized and removed before demolition. Deactivation is expected to be completed in October.

“The X-710 has played an important role at the Portsmouth Site, from verifying samples in our laboratories to supporting research and development,” Federal Project Director Christy Brown said. “The building contains potential hazards that must be addressed, so we are collecting data on the materials of construction, evaluating risks, and safely advancing our cleanup mission by remediating the hazards, which includes removal, if necessary.”

The X-710 Technical Services Building stands near the concrete pad of the former X-326 Process Building and the X-300 Plant Control Facility. X-710 played a vital role at the site and once held hundreds of employees.

The two-story building had offices, a records vault, multiple conference rooms, a technical library and a machine shop, but it was best known for its 100-plus laboratories. Some of its labs included facilities for uranium sampling, metals preparation, radiochemistry, mass spectrometry and laser research.

The X-710 deactivation includes asbestos and beryllium sampling and removal of all low-level waste. Some of the electronic scrap material will be shipped offsite for disposal while other portions of it will be sent to the Portsmouth On-Site Waste Disposal Facility. Hard drives and other electronics with an internal memory are shredded.

In the first frame, Records Management and Document Control Specialist April Pendleton organizes records for efficient processing and transfer to the records vault. Documentation left behind in the X-710 Technical Services Building must be evaluated to determine if it’s a record and if it’s already accounted for in the records system. In the second frame, workers use a freight elevator in X-710 to remove low-level waste from the second floor. From left, Project Worker Rhonda Ward pushes the cart, while Project Worker Brock Wooldridge waits in the elevator.

“In the coming weeks, demolition crews will be removing trees from the east side of the building to give themselves a head start,” said Caleb Payne, deactivation project manager with Portsmouth Site contractor Southern Ohio Cleanup Company. “Meanwhile, we are updating the egress lighting, taking building characterization samples and removing lead and refrigerants from the areas that do not contain laboratories.”

X-710 was constructed in 1955 and expanded in 1975, adding 30,000 square feet to the original 109,000 square feet of floor space. The building is adjacent to the X-300 Plant Control Facility and the former X-326 Process Building, which crews demolished in 2022.

-Contributor: Michelle Teeters