Air Center of Excellence

Sherri Lloyd, Product Marketing Manager at Pace^®, spoke with Mariah Peronto, Air Program Manager for Pace^®, to discuss the Air Center of Excellence which officially opened in May 2023.

Pace^® recently opened an Air Center of Excellence. Can you tell us a little bit about the background behind this decision?

As readers may know, creating a Center of Excellence, or CoE, is a popular way for companies to enhance their performance and competitiveness by establishing a dedicated team or department responsible for developing and promoting best practices in a particular area.

Pace^® has been providing air testing services for over three decades. It made sense to concentrate this expertise and bring together professionals with deep air testing and analysis experience, while adding significant capacity to address a variety of needs. Today, the Pace^® Air Center of Excellence is the largest air lab testing facility in the United States.

An added benefit of the Pace^® Air CoE is its alignment to our Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) program and reducing our impact on the environment.

That’s interesting. Can you go into a little more depth on the ESG impact?

As a company that cares about the environment, Pace^® actively seeks out ways to minimize our carbon footprint by reducing waste and conserving space. The consolidation of our two biggest air laboratories into a single Air Center of Excellence is a significant accomplishment toward that end.

In addition, with the current labor market, innovative management of people has become more critical. The Air Center of Excellence enables better talent management and skills training, while providing customers easy access to technical expertise.

Thanks for that background. Can you highlight some of the benefits that working with Pace® provides to organizations requiring air testing and analysis?

I am happy to say that we have increased our capacity to meet the growing demand. Our range of sampling media and setups is one of the largest in the United States, boasting 6,400 cans available at the Air CoE and 11,000 throughout the network. Through canister inventory consolidation, we have gained management efficiencies in a market with very tight supply.

Additionally, we are currently conducting a pilot program for just-in-time distribution centers to better cater to the real-time needs of clients across the country.

Also, by having a centralized location with a wealth of subject-matter expertise and tools, we can streamline the training and implementation of new methods. This enables us to effectively scale continuous improvement initiatives and develop and monitor quality control systems more efficiently to meet the needs of our clients.

I have every confidence that our Air Center of Excellence will lead the way in establishing itself as a model for innovation and quality. From a quality perspective, our recently introduced Center of Excellence LIMs system is efficient and adaptable, designed to meet the varied needs of both our clients and the regulatory environment. Our team of experts stays informed of the latest industry developments, enabling us to choose the most effective approaches and provide our teams with training on the latest technologies, techniques, processes, and tools.

Can you tell us how Pace^® is investing in the CoE?

Of course. With the establishment of this center, we can now streamline our resources and improve our efficiency. By adopting best practices, we can eliminate waste and avoid unnecessary duplication of effort. As a result, we can save costs and allocate these funds towards enhancing the customer experience.

I'd also like to mention that the money saved from the real estate consolidation has been reinvested into the laboratory to accommodate the growing need for canisters and to purchase additional instrumentation.

How is the Air Center of Excellence different from other Pace^® laboratories that provide air analysis?

Historically, our primary air labs were canister-based labs doing whole air analysis from summa canisters and tedlar bags. In contrast, our specialty air labs analysis included sorbent-based methods where air is drawn through a sorbent bed and further processed. These samples may be analyzed in the semi volatile or metals departments instead, similar to the way that you would analyze a water and soil extract.

When we decided to set up the Air Center of Excellence, we concluded that the best way to go was to concentrate on the air analysis from summa canisters and tedlar bags. This would allow us to provide our customer with a better ultimate experience.

What do you envision in the future for the Air Center of Excellence?
There are multiple areas that we are looking to focus on; innovation, standardization of best practices, PFAS expansion, and an ongoing investment in the training and development of our team. We are committed to providing our customers with the highest quality products and services, and the focus on these areas is integral to that goal.

We will have a team focused on standardization of best practices to improve our customers day to day. Keeping an eye on the future, we will also be expanding our PFAS Air capabilities and bringing on additional air methods. This will involve our active participation in committees for emerging methods and bringing new methods online that we believe will be beneficial to our customers. As always, our thought leaders will continue to share insights on topics that affect our customers through webinars, articles, and speaking engagements at conferences.

The Pace^® Air CoE will continue its innovation, reducing our impact on the environment by looking towards new technologies. We are also looking into ways to reduce our carbon footprint by utilizing more sustainable materials and processes. Our commitment to continuous improvement will help ensure that our customers receive the best service and results possible.

Any final thoughts?

I want to express my gratitude to all our air customers who were understanding of the change. By consolidating Pace^® air testing capabilities we can now serve our consumers with greater capacity and quicker outcomes. Customers can also pick up and return sample canisters at convenient places through our localized distribution network that supports the Air CoE.