HORTICULTURAL RESEARCH

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22371, 7 April 1938, Page 12

HORTICULTURAL RESEARCH

CONTRACT LET FOR NEW STATION SPECIAL AIR-CONDITIONING PLANT [THE PRESS Special Service.] AUCKLAND, April 6. A contract for the construction of a new horticultural research station at Mount Albert has been let by the Public Works Department to W. H. Whittaker and Company, Ltd. It is expected that a start will be made almost immediately, and that the work will be completed in about seven months. The contract price is net disclosed.

The building, which will contain administrative offices, laboratories, a museum, and other sections required for research and experiments, will be air conditioned; but the present contract does not provide for that service. Tenders are likely to be called in about a month for the provision of air conditioning. Although the studios of IYA, the automatic telephone exchanges, and some of the freezing stores are air conditioned, there are several features about the system to be installed at the research station at Mount Albert that will make it unique in the Dominion. Not only will it be necessary to sterilise the air entering the laboratories, and other experimental and research rooms to exclude spores; but the air will have to be sterilised on leaving the chambers, so that spores will not be released therefrom to the adjoining orchards. It will also be necessary to regulate the humidity of the air entering the laboratories, besides re' .dating its temperature. Humidity will be dealt with by condensation, air being brought into contact with metal plates. It is recognised that the problem of dealing with humidity is greater in Auckland than in other parts of New Zealand.