JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - Issue #104 - April/May 2016 - 36

redevelopment

"There are many unique opportunities
here for composites companies"

interview

Brunswick Landing, Maine's centre for innovation is the business hub
of the former Naval Air Station Brunswick (NASB) base property. The
Midcoast Regional Redevelopment Authority (MRRA) is in charge of
redeveloping the property after the closing of the base. Within this
framework, composites play a major role. We wanted to find out
more about this and the future in store for these materials.

BEn SturtEvant
MarkEting anD COMMuniCatiOnS ManagEr
MiDCOaSt rEgiOnaL rEDEvELOpMEnt authOrity

JEC Composites Magazine: Can you tell us
more about MRRA and Brunswick Landing
and their objectives?

Ben Sturtevant: The Midcoast

Regional Redevelopment Authority
(MRRA) is a quasi-governmental organization created by the State of Maine to
implement the re-use plan for the former
Naval Air Station Brunswick and manage
the transition of the property from
military to civilian use. Our goals are to
create high-quality jobs and to recover
and exceed the economic impact that was
lost when the Navy left in 2011. We have
already surpassed several of our economic development goals with more than 825
jobs created by 80-plus businesses that
have located here at Brunswick Landing.

Brunswick Landing, Maine's centre for
innovation, is a high-technology business and industrial park with its own
airport (Brunswick Executive Airport),
a community college, a self-contained
power grid, more than 200,000 m2
of industrial and commercial space
situated on a beautiful 1300-hectare
property with housing, open space, and
numerous outdoor recreational oppor-

tunities available. Brunswick Landing
has centres for excellence in each of our
target industrial sectors, including composites/advanced materials, aerospace/
aviation, biotech/biomed, renewable
energy and information technology. We
want to continue promoting Brunswick
Landing as a great place to do business
and eventually fill all of the available
space with innovative companies that
are able to create good jobs for the area.
We see ourselves as especially attractive
to composites businesses.
JCM: Why are you so interested in composites? How did this come about?

B. S.: The composites industry has been
historically one of the Midcoast region's
(Brunswick Landing location) strengths.
Traditionally, this part of Maine has been
a major boat-building area. Navy boats
(destroyers, battleships, frigates, cruisers) have been built at nearby Bath since
the 1800s. As new fabrication methods,
technology and materials have evolved,
the area has developed a strong composites workforce and supply chain. Based
on the region's industrial strengths and
facilities that were transferred to us by
the Navy, we determined that composites would be a good industry to focus
our business attraction efforts on. It has

36 jec composites magazine / No104 April - May 2016

The Composites Engineering Research Lab has
recently moved into a larger space on Brunswick
Landing at TechPlace to accommodate growth.

worked out well so far. We now have
a cluster of companies manufacturing
composite products for the construction,
aerospace, wind-power, marine, and ballistics industries. Several of these companies are based at Brunswick Landing and
dozens more are within an hour's drive.
Overall, the State of Maine itself has a
robust composites industry, which you
have learned a lot more about at JEC
World, where we were with a booth.
The industry is comprised of small
and medium-sized companies who are
proud to deliver innovative, high-quality, cutting-edge design and manufacturing services for the industrial, marine,
automotive, aerospace, and architecture
sectors in Maine, as well as for business-

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - Issue #104 - April/May 2016