State probe of Tesla's LI lab nears finish

A state investigation vital to the future of physicist Nikola Tesla's former Shoreham laboratory will be finished as soon as next month, state officials said.

Advocates want to turn the 1903 lab, called Wardenclyffe, into a museum and science center. But the facility, where Tesla once researched wireless transmission, has been addled with pollution and closed for a quarter of a century.

Marc Baisch, a Rocky Point developer, has expressed interest in buying the 16-acre property and turning part of it over to a nonprofit group that wants to develop the museum. But Baisch has said he first wants the state Department of Environmental Conservation to sign off on the site.

The investigation into the site's environmental health will be finished "in early 2012, at which time we will have more information" on its condition, said Rick Georgeson, a DEC spokesman.

The completion of the investigation is good news for those who have waited for the museum project to advance, said Jane Alcorn, president of Tesla Science Center, the group pushing for the museum. She has said the nonprofit wants to use the property for a science museum, public meeting space and working laboratory.

"The time is finally here," she said. "It's certainly been a drawn out process, and it's certainly not over."

The lab is the only standing monument to Tesla's work. He lost the property in 1915 as he struggled with debt, and the property grew into a photochemical plant. Agfa-Gevaert bought it about 40 years ago and has worked to clean it.

The end of the DEC investigation is a "welcome piece of news," said Chris Santomassimo, an attorney for Agfa.