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LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — The Nebraska Innovation Campus has repurposed trees from the former State Fair Park to build furniture for the research campus.
Last week, a boardroom table crafted from green ash trees was installed in the Innovation Commons to be used by various groups, according to developer Josh Berger. It took over 300 man-hours for Jay Ryan of Jay's Woods in Bennet to create the template for the 22-foot-long table, and glue strips of green ash together. The table's base was constructed by TMCO of Lincoln.
"Between here and Devaney, we had to take all of the trees off of the old State Fair campus," Berger said. "We did that to move dirt to the east side of Innovation Commons to make the land buildable, but we felt bad about cutting down the trees and decided we needed to do something."
Berger had the idea of converting the trees into lumber and looking for opportunities to integrate the wood back into the campus.
The executive director of Innovation Campus, Dan Duncan, says that the research campus tries everything that it can to be sustainable and cognizant of the environment.
Another table that will be built from wood from the fairgrounds this spring will be installed in the campus' Food Innovation Center, which will open later this year. The center will be the home of University of Nebraska-Lincoln's Food Science and Technology Department and private partner ConAgra Foods.
The Lincoln Journal Star (http://bit.ly/1IMeNn4 ) reports the 250-acre research campus facilitates partnerships between the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and the private sector.
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Information from: Lincoln Journal Star, http://www.journalstar.com
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