Economic benefits seen from new innovation zone
By Diane Urbani de la Paz, Peninsula Daily News
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Two months after winning one of the state's 11 Innovation Partnership Zone designations from Gov. Chris Gregoire, the representatives of the partners gathered at the Sequim lab to trumpet the new label.
The partners are Battelle, which runs the marine research operations lab on Sequim Bay for the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory and the U.S. Department of Energy, Peninsula College and the Economic Development Council.
Together they received the IPZ designation on Oct. 1 after Rotmark and the EDC put together an application last summer, but lost out on some $4.28 million in state grants that went to five of the designees.
But none of the partners is gnashing teeth over that.
Being in the zone, said Peninsula College president Tom Keegan, means fresh opportunities for students, researchers and inventors.
Students will, he hopes, serve as interns in Battelle's Sequim labs, while learning in the classroom about the concept of intellectual property and how to turn lab work into commercial products.
The college is "creating an opportunity for innovation," Keegan added.
It would have been nice to get a million-dollar grant from the state, he said.
But the college and lab are capable of advancing without it.
"There are two ways to go," Keegan said. One is to "get the money up front and then figure it out," and the other is the way it'll be done here: Bring the partners together, let the ideas flow and then go back to the state with a grant application.
Van De Wege sponsor
State Rep. Kevin Van De Wege, a Democrat from Sequim, was the prime sponsor of House Bill 1091, which established IPZs this year.
On Tuesday, the 24th District lawmaker talked about how he thought the bill would sail fast to passage - but then a senator he wouldn't name tried to radically change the legislation.
That senator's version would have concentrated the IPZs in the Seattle-Tacoma region, and shut out the North Olympic Peninsula, Van De Wege said.
After some struggle, the freshman representative got his bill passed, though "we almost weren't here today."
Van De Wege, whose district includes Clallam, Jefferson and part of Grays Harbor County, has another feather in his legislative cap since Aberdeen and Hoquiam were named an IPZ.
Unlike Sequim and Port Angeles, those timber towns received one of the state grants to bolster development of the newly opened biodiesel plant on Port of Grays Harbor land.
Research-based industry
In Clallam County, the IPZ designation enables the development of a research-based industry, said Pacific Northwest National Laboratory commercialization manager Mike Schwenk.
To attract the best and brightest scientists, the lab must offer high quality of life, and that's something Sequim offers, Schwenk said.
"We need to make sure the communities around us are strong, so we can recruit the staff and keep the staff," the lab must have to flourish.
A master plan calls for expansion of the Sequim labs and staff, said Battelle operations manager Van Briggs.
He and Marine Sciences Laboratory director Richard Ecker are working with the Clallam County commissioners and Sequim city planners on extending the water and sewer lines necessary for that expansion.
Already the Sequim labs are known for wide-ranging research.
Scientists study the effects of pollutants on the marine environment, mollusks' capacity to detect a chemical or biological attack on the coastline, and algaes' potential for generating biofuels.
With the college, the Economic Development Council and PNNL as its partners, the local laboratories should be able to further grow the markets for inventions born here, Schwenk said.
Jobs for the young
Briggs added that if this collaboration creates jobs, it could lessen the exodus of young educated people out of Clallam County.
"One of the things we export is our youth," he said.
"My daughter is leaving this year to go to school."
He wants her to have the option of returning to the Peninsula, instead of assuming this place offers too few professional opportunities.
"Now we've got to figure out how to get the community involved," Briggs added, "to make this a better place."
Keegan acknowledged that this zone is still an unknown.
The scientific projects and collaborations are yet to form, the future is wide open, and those are good things, he said.
"We could be sitting here two years from now, thinking we've got projects we would not have thought of until we started working on this," Keegan added.
"We're going to look for ideas for research, and we're going to find the people to turn those projects into jobs . . . and generate some wealth," Schwenk said, adding that the partners plan on converting the college's and labs' "intellectual horsepower" into jobs.
"We're looking forward," he said, "to getting started tomorrow."
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Sequim Editor Diane Urbani de la Paz can be reached at 360-681-2391 or diane.urbani@peninsuladailynews.com.
Last modified: December 04. 2007 9:00PM