SNOLAB receives 5-star energy rating from Camfil

On Tuesday February 19th Rick Deguire, SNOLAB Surface Operation Supervisor was presented with an award to recognize the facility’s 5 Star energy rating from Camfil. This achievement recognizes that SNOLAB is meeting all ECI (Energy Cost Index) air filtration standards for the surface building clean room laboratories. These surface facilities support the underground clean lab. Many of the materials and experiment components in the underground lab were first assembled and handled in the surface clean labs. 

SNOLAB’s underground laboratory has approximately 5,000 m² of clean lab space that is maintained at a Class 2000 clean lab, meaning that there are less than 2000 particles of .5 micron in diameter per cubic foot of air. In your home or office there would be about 1 million particles of that size in your cubic foot of air. In the mine drift outside SNOLAB the count would be 10 million! 

The SNOLAB surface building includes 436 m² of clean room laboratories that are maintained at a clean level that exceeds Class 2000. These facilities are crucial for the handling, cleaning and transportation of materials being used for the experiments underground. The surface labs also provide space for chemical testing to support the experiments underway in the underground lab.

The 5 Star achievement from Camfil indicates that SNOLAB is using the most energy efficient and longest lasting filters available to achieve the cleanliness levels needed to support the experiments underground.