IMEG provided engineering design and construction administration services for MedPharm Iowa’s new cannabis manufacturing facility in Des Moines – the first facility granted a license to produce medical cannabis in Iowa. The project included renovating a 64-year-old freight distribution warehouse for growing, processing, extraction, and packaging of medical cannabis.

Engineers provided MEP, fire protection, and technology design for the facility, which includes: administration space; receiving, potting, cultivation, mother grow rooms, and utility/support spaces; flower and vegetative grow rooms, general circulation areas, and harvest, curing and processing spaces; and post-process, extraction, formulation, quality control, packaging, shipping, and support spaces.

The highly secure facility is designed with video surveillance of all critical locations, access control and intrusion detection, and design services for structured cabling and audio/visual systems. Lighting specifically designed for plant growth was used in grow and flower rooms. Automated lighting controls systems were integrated into each room to simulate natural lighting from dawn to dusk.

In the plant growing area, HVAC systems were designed to remove heat, handle the high moisture load, purify the air, and circulate large amounts of air, while exhaust air was filtered to remove odors. A reverse osmosis water system used for plant watering and humidification included a nutrient mixing system. CO2 enrichment for grow rooms and CO2 distribution for the extraction process included safety monitoring systems.