The new Chimie Balard building gives a new dimension to research

On June 13, 2023, the new Chimie Balard building at the CNRS in Montpellier was inaugurated, considered to be the largest real estate operation dedicated to chemical research in France. The inauguration was an opportunity to highlight the joint CNRS/Michelin HydrogenLab laboratory, whose far-reaching partnership is based primarily on ambitious fundamental research aimed at meeting a number of major industrial challenges in the hydrogen sector. 

With its 25,500 m2, 800-person capacity and 2.5 kilometers of bench space, the new Balard chemistry building on the CNRS route de Mende campus is the largest chemistry research center in France. It was inaugurated on Tuesday June 13 by Pierre-André Durand, Prefect of the Occitanie Region, Prefect of Haute-Garonne; Nadia Pellefigue, Vice-President of the Occitanie Region in charge of Higher Education, Research, Europe and International Relations, representing President Carole Delga, and Antoine Petit, Chairman and CEO of CNRS.

Financed to the tune of €62 million by the Occitanie/Pyrénées-Méditerranée region and €1 million by the CNRS, the building houses the research teams of the Institut des biomolécules Max Mousseron (IBMM) and the Institut Charles Gerhardt Montpellier (ICGM), joint research units of the CNRS, the University of Montpellier and theENSCM.

The world's largest chemical research center

With this new building, Montpellier now boasts the largest chemistry research center in France, both in terms of surface area and number of staff. It is designed to meet the high technical demands of the research activities carried out there, with 244 research modules designed to accommodate almost 800 people, an analysis and characterization platform housing heavy and medium-heavy equipment dedicated to research teams and industrial partners, and an innovation and transfer center designed to host start-ups in the field of green chemistry.

The Balard building is at the center of an integrated campus of exceptional dimensions, covering all the disciplines of chemistry and its applications, notably in the fields of energy (hydrogen and batteries), health (active ingredients, drugs, biomaterials, living molecules), the environment (air and water quality, seawater desalination) and green chemistry (biomass conversion).

Focus on hydrogen

The new building is home to the joint CNRS/Michelin HydrogenLab laboratory, which brings together the skills of the Institut Charles Gerhardt de Montpellier (ICGM), a joint research unit of the CNRS, the University of Montpellier and the ENSCM, and those of Michelin's Direction Opérationnelle Recherches & Développements (DORD) in the study of hydrogen, with a view to designing virtuous and innovative materials.

The aim of this joint laboratory is to develop new fuel cell and electrolyzer core materials, using new approaches to the elaboration and shaping of these materials, in order to increase the sustainability of the hydrogen industry. The collaboration involves the development of 6 projects, including theses, post-doctorates and Master's courses, focusing on the improvement of catalysts for water electrolysis, as well as the development of new membranes and nanofibre networks to significantly enhance sustainability.

Montpellier's chemical industry: a synergistic community

The Pôle Chimie Balard was created in 2007, under the impetus of the Region and the French State, to structure the chemistry sector by giving it real visibility and strong governance, formalizing the commitment of the universities, schools and organizations that oversee the chemistry laboratories: the University of Montpellier (UM), the Montpellier National School of Chemistry(ENSCM), the French Atomic Energy and Alternative Energies Commission (CEA), and the French National Center for Scientific Research(CNRS). Research .

Geographically located close to the University of Montpellier's Triolet Campus and on part of the CNRS campus, the two Chimie Balard Formation and Research buildings form the beating heart of Montpellier chemistry. Bringing together the two largest laboratories in the immediate vicinity of the European Membrane Institute has led to the emergence of an exceptional scientific campus, one of the very first in Europe, competing with the chemistry departments of prestigious European universities such as ETH (Zürich, Switzerland), Oxford and Bristol (UK), or the German center of excellence of the Max-Planck-Institut für Kohlenforschung (Mülheim).

The ambition of the Pôle Chimie Balard, which also includes theInstitut de Chimie Séparative de Marcoule in the Gard region, is to propose an ambitious project for the development of chemistry, by pooling skills and resources for sustainable development in three areas: energy and materials; resource conservation and environmental protection; and chemistry for human health and well-being.