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Central Utility Plant expansion marks major milestone with topping-out ceremony

May 8, 2026

By Zoe Juanitas

Mike Condrin, interim chief executive officer of UC Davis Health, signs the final steel beam at the Central Utility Plant topping out ceremony.
Mike Condrin, interim chief executive officer of UC Davis Health, and other attendees signed the beam before it was hoisted into place.

UC Davis Health and the Central Utility Plant expansion team celebrated a major milestone May 7 with a topping-out ceremony, marking the structural completion of the new CUP Annex.

"While this building may not be where patients receive care directly, it is essential to everything we do," said Mike Condrin, interim chief executive officer of UC Davis Health. "It modernizes and expands the infrastructure that supports every operating room, inpatient unit, lab and clinic across our campus."

In keeping with construction tradition, UC Davis Health leaders, project partners, and representatives from Plant Operations and Maintenance and Facilities Planning and Development signed the final steel beam before a crane operator hoisted it into place.

Construction workers guide a ceremonial steel beam into place during the topping out ceremony for the Central Utility Plant expansion project at UC Davis Health. The beam is decorated with an American flag, California state flag and evergreen tree.
UC Davis Health officially broke ground on the Central Utility Plant expansion in October 2025.

Jon Foad, president of general contractor Rudolph and Sletten, said the topping out tradition dates back more than 1,000 years to Scandinavia.

"To appease the tree-dwelling spirits displaced by construction, an evergreen tree is placed on the highest beam to symbolize light, safety, growth and luck," Foad said.

The United States later adopted the tradition, adding an American flag to symbolize strength, security and a project completed without loss of life.

Powering the next generation of care

As the last and largest project in UC Davis Health's Vision 2030 expansion, the California Tower will place significant demand on campus utilities. The CUPx will help meet that demand by expanding the electrical capacity and redundancy needed for 24/7 clinical operations.

The project includes nearly 1 mile of new underground electrical and hydronic piping. These dual utility pathways will help keep essential hospital spaces operational during maintenance or unexpected outages.

Rendering of the Central Utility Plant expansion.
The expansion and modernization of the CUP will reduce UC Davis Health emissions by 60%.

The upgraded electrical backbone is a key step toward campus decarbonization and UC Davis Health's sustainable future. It reduces reliance on combustion-based systems as the campus adopts technologies such as heat recovery and electric chillers and prepares for future electrification phases.

"This infrastructure investment helps us deliver on the promise we make to our patients, their families and our communities — that we will be here for the long term," said Bruce Hall, chief clinical officer of UC Davis Health.

Project collaborators include UC Davis Health Plant Operations and Maintenance, Facilities Planning and Development, Rudolph and Sletten, Nacht & Lewis, AEI Electrical, Redwood Electric Group, Mazzetti, Airco Mechanical, Siegfried Engineering, Preston Pipelines, George Reed, Buehler Engineering Inc., Viking Steel, and Nevell Group Inc.