April 18, 2024
"The patent-pending treatment produces a semi-permeable barrier that allows the wood to breathe while locking in long-lasting protections," says ChemTech president, Tom Comery.
Photo: ChemTech
Boca Raton-based Neptunya Ocean Power won the 2022 Cade Prize for its Octopodz technology, a new offshore wind turbine that lowers energy costs through reduced weight and a floating design that eliminates the need for a separate foundation obstruction. Brazilian founder Rodrigo Griesi and his family became U.S. citizens the same week the prestigious award was announced.
Photo: Neptunya Ocean Power
West Palm Beach approved plans for a transit village comprising 986 apartments and a 108-room hotel in four, 25-story towers plus retail and office space on the rail line on the western edge of downtown and near the future site of a UF grad school campus.
Photo: Rendering: Arquitectonica
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Southeast Florida Roundup
ChemTech opens plant in Fort Pierce to showcase environmentally friendly wood treatments
Mike Vogel | 12/15/2022
INNOVATION
Safer Wood
Lumber treatment company ChemTech opened an eight-employee plant in Fort Pierce to showcase to sawmills, lumber dealers and others its “environmentally friendly” protective treatments for soft woods, plywood and engineered wood. Its innovation, called TechWood, sequesters 73% of formaldehyde emissions, making for healthier indoor air, while being 30% lighter than pressure-treated lumber as well as offering a 50% reduction in moisture absorption and improved stability, says Tom Comery, ChemTech president.
“The patent-pending treatment produces a semi-permeable barrier that allows the wood to breathe while locking in long-lasting protections,” Comery says.
The company plans a 2,000-sq.-ft. expansion of the 8,000-sq.-ft. plant.
REAL ESTATE
- Green Cay Life Plan Village and co-developers BRP Senior Housing Management and Greenbrier Development opened a sales office for their $250-million, continuing-care retirement development on 15 acres in Boynton Beach. The project, expected to break ground in 2024 and be completed in 2026, will have independent living units and assisted living and memory care units. Buy-in costs are expected to begin in the mid-$600,000s.
- Orlando-based Tavistock Development began selling condo units at The Residences at Pier Sixty-Six, a tower and villa addition to the waterfront hotel it acquired in 2016 in Fort Lauderdale.
- Privately held affordable housing developer Housing Trust Group completed its $36-million, 96-apartment Hudson Village. Units are reserved for people earning 50%, 60% or 70% of local area median income.
- Construction has begun on Seagis Property Group’s 199,643-sq.-ft. warehouse in Hollywood just outside Port Everglades. The project is scheduled for completion next year.
- The Delray Beach Housing Authority and its partner, Smith & Henzy Advisory Group, broke ground on the 60-unit workforce housing project Island Cove Apartments. It’s scheduled for completion by year-end 2023.
- Martin County commissioners voted 3-2 to approve a land-use change that will allow development of Discovery Land’s Atlantic Fields, a luxury low-density development of 317 homes and an 18-hole golf course on 1,530 acres. Discovery clients Tom Brady, Michael Strahan and Wall Street executives wrote e-mails of support for the project.
- New York-based Related Cos. plans a 456,000-sq.-ft., 25-story office building in downtown West Palm Beach. Plans call for 15,000 square feet of retail. Related, a company of New York’s Stephen Ross, is the largest downtown office landlord in West Palm Beach.
EDUCATION
- Florida Atlantic University broke ground on the Kurt and Marilyn Wallach Holocaust and Jewish Studies Building on its Boca Raton campus. FAU received an $838,483 state grant to market and grow its cybersecurity, cryptology and business management certifi- cation courses and programs. FAU’s grant was one of 24 the state funded totaling $15.6 million for cybersecurity and information tech.
TRAVEL
- The cruise industry’s largest annual trade conference, Seatrade Cruise Global, moved its convention for next year to March and to the newly renovated Greater Fort Lauderdale Broward County Convention Center, leaving Miami Beach after 30 years. Generally, the convention was held in April, but that posed a conflict with the Formula One Grand Prix event in Miami in 2023.
HEALTH CARE
- Prosecutors dropped manslaughter charges against three nurses who worked at the Rehabilitation Center at Hollywood Hills when 12 patients died in the heat following Hurricane Irma in 2017. One defendant, the chief administrative officer, still faces charges.
RETAIL
- Tamarac-based City Furniture took a minority equity stake in Palm Beach County-based digital strategy company PeakActivity, which aids companies in growing through e-commerce, digital marketing and tech.
MANUFACTURING
- Boat manufacturer Contender Boats began production of semi-custom sport fishing boats at its 100,000-sq.-ft. Fort Pierce plant. The plant will employ 200 at capacity making 32-foot and smaller boats. Larger boats up to 44 feet are made at Contender’s headquarters in Homestead.
