State leaders and University of Wyoming officials joined Laramie residents today to celebrate the grand opening of the High Bay Research Facility .

UW Foundation President and CEO Ben Blalock presided over the ceremony. Speakers included Executive Director of the School of Energy Resources Dr. Mark Northam, Hess Corporation  Exploration and Production COO and President Greg Hill, UW President Laurie Nichols Governor Matt Mead, UW Board of Trustees President John MacPherson, Wyoming Senate President Eli Bebout and Speaker of the Wyoming House of Representatives Steve Harshman.

The speakers expressed their pride and the new facility, which will house laboratories that will enable research to improve understanding of recovering oil from unconventional and conventional oil and gas reservoirs, as part of UW’s Tier-1 Engineering Initiative.

“What is being done here is not being done anywhere else in the world,” Mead said to the attendees.

The facilities that High Bay houses includes the Center of Innovation for Flow Through Porous Media, the Improved Oil Recovery Laboratory and the Geomechanical /Petrology Laboratory.

After the ceremony, Laramie residents, lawmakers and UW staff, faculty and students toured the new facilities.

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