The US Social Security Administration (SSA) has awarded the contract to design and build its new data center in Urbana, Maryland, to Hensel Phelps Construction, a Colorado-based general contractor.

The contract’s total cost is about US$192m, according to the General Services Administration’s (GSA) documents filed online. Called the National Support Center, the facility will replace the administration’s existing data center in Woodlawn, Maryland, which is quickly approaching the end of its useful life.

SSA bought the Urbana site around late August 2011. The property is part of the Urbana Corporate Center, a large campus that is also home to a 60,000 sq ft data center of Fannie Mae, a provider of housing loans to low-income Americans.

There is pressure to complete the project quickly. The existing data center was built in 1979 and is quickly approaching the end of its useful life.

In a report released in 2011, the SSA’s inspector general concluded that the facility would not be able to support the administration's expanding capacity requirements by 2012, estimating that the new data center would not be completed until 2015.

The future 400,000 sq ft Tier III data center in Urbana will support about 10MW of IT load.

The building is required to achieve LEED Gold rating by the US Green Building Council. LEED (leadership in energy and environmental design) is a system for rating construction projects’ green design and construction practices.

Hensel Phelps was competing for the contract with DPR and Turner, who were both shortlisted along with the winner after an initial round of request-for-proposal solicitations.

About 280 vendors expressed interest in participating in the project, including Walsh, Wright Line, Panduit, Verizon and others.