UC Berkeley & Lawrence Berkeley National Lab Relocation

Yes. The Joint Genome Institute (JGI) is heavy on Illumina, PacBio, and Oxford Nanopore sequencers and their associated automated liquid handling lines. The Joint BioEnergy Institute (JBEI) runs bioreactors, fermenters, and analytical chemistry instrumentation. The Energy Biosciences Institute (EBI) overlaps with JBEI on bioprocessing. The Molecular Foundry runs electron microscopy and nanofabrication tools. We coordinate with each institute on calibration windows, OEM service scheduling, and the LBNL EH&S advisory inspection.

UC Berkeley Environment, Health and Safety (EH&S) runs the campus lab safety program and coordinates with Facilities Services on building access. For lab moves across or out of Stanley Hall, Li Ka Shing Center, Energy Biosciences Building, Valley Life Sciences, Hildebrand Hall, Tan Hall, and the rest of the campus, we accept the Berkeley EH&S timeline, file the documentation they require, submit the chemical inventory through their system, and stage our crew around their advisory inspection and final clearance walkthrough. We are not the on-campus internal mover. We come in for cross-campus, off-campus, and external biotech tenant relocations. See our compliance guide for documentation details.

Our Hayward operations base is 10 to 20 minutes from LBNL gate and 15 to 25 minutes from the UC Berkeley campus, depending on the building. Rapid crew dispatch into the Berkeley research corridor is one of the operational reasons clients pick us over Bay Area movers staged further north. We can run same-day site surveys for urgent Berkeley moves and weekend or after-hours shifts without bringing crews in from the South Bay or the Peninsula.

For LBNL or a UC Berkeley lab with biosafety cabinets, regulated chemicals, or more than 20 instruments, we recommend contacting us 10 to 14 weeks in advance. LBNL DOE clearance windows and Berkeley EH&S advisory inspections add lead time. Add OEM service vendor scheduling for instruments like the Bruker mass specs at JBEI, JGI sequencers, and ultracentrifuges at Stanley Hall. Larger moves benefit from a four-to-six month planning window. See our lab move timeline guide for the full breakdown.

JBEI bioreactors (Sartorius BIOSTAT, Eppendorf BioFlo, New Brunswick) and fermenters travel in air-ride suspension trucks with anti-vibration packaging. We coordinate with the JBEI bioprocess team on shutdown, cleaning, and reactor head removal where the OEM specifies it. JGI sequencing platforms (Illumina NovaSeq, PacBio Revio, Oxford Nanopore PromethION) travel under their OEM-published transport procedures with OEM-specified locks. We coordinate directly with Illumina, PacBio, and Oxford Nanopore field service on the post-move recertification window. Documented instrument tracking and transfer logs travel with each unit.

For short Berkeley moves under one hour of transit, samples often remain in the powered-down -80C freezer pre-chilled with dry ice, with temperature data loggers riding along. For cross-campus or off-campus moves with longer transit windows, we coordinate sample transfer into a backup -80 at the destination, into LN2 dewars, or into temporary dry ice storage. The freezer is transported upright on air-ride suspension with orientation indicators and given a four-to-twelve hour compressor settle period after placement before restart. See our -80 freezer move guide for the full procedure.

Ontrack Moving carries $10,000,000 general liability for building and property protection, which meets Certificate of Insurance requirements at UC Berkeley, LBNL, and the surrounding biotech and research corridor buildings. Equipment is covered by federal cargo liability at $0.60 per pound per article under FMCSA requirements. Additional valuation protection is available for high-value instruments such as mass spectrometers, NMR systems, or NGS sequencers. COIs with additional insured endorsements are delivered to LBNL Procurement or Berkeley EH&S in advance of move day.