The Archives and Records Office (ARO) provides a number of archiving and records management services, including the transfer, retrieval, and destruction of Laboratory records at no charge to the customer.
In an attempt to properly document the history of science at the Lab, the Archives and Records Office currently provides a free service to scientists to assist with archiving their scientific and technical records. This service includes consultation, boxing, transporting, processing, and indexing of research and development (R&D) records.
Laboratory business/operational records are not included under this free service. Full processing of business records by ARO is a direct charge service.
Before researchers leave the Lab, they should contact Special Projects Archivist Beret Ranelletti ([email protected], extension 4685) to discuss their scientific records. When a scientific project is completed the Principal Investigator for the project should contact ARO's Special Projects Archivist to insure that the appropriate project records are archived. Beret will assess the records and determine what needs to be archived. Scientists and administrative assistants do not need to fill out Records Transmittal forms since indexing the records is a part of the free service.
Please note that all records are not kept permanently. Under the DOE R&D Records Retention Schedule, most are kept from 10-25 years. Only 5% of records are permanent. This means that most likely you will get notices for destruction of the records at some point. If you choose not to have them destroyed by the Federal Records Center and we cannot reschedule them, you will be given the records back. Federal records must remain on site. They cannot be stored at home. Because work space is limited, we encourage the destruction of records when it is no longer a legal requirement to keep them.
Materials that cannot be archived include:
- All types of publications (we want original documents only)
- Raw data older than 10 years
- Personal papers
For more information on this service, please contact Beret; there is also a PowerPoint presentation on the service available for download or viewing.
