Plans for a £86m super laboratory for the University of Sheffield have been conditionally approved by Sheffield City Council.

The confirmation of the building plans have come during intense strike action at the university – the strikers’ main concerns revolve around cost-cutting and potential redundancies.

Named the The Central Teaching Laboratories, the building is set to be built near the Ring Road on Upper Hanover Street.

The building will provide two 300 student teaching laboratories, a Medical Teaching Unit and collaborative teaching spaces for the Faculty of Science.

Members from the the University and College Union (UCU) began strike action on 17 November and are expected to continue for another week.

One of the strikers speaking on the picket line today, Professor Willy Kitchen from the University’s Department of Education, said: “I would want to understand why that £86m is going to have a greater benefit to the student experience than cutting a significant more number of staff.”

The council has now published a planning permission notice for the building. Although there are several conditions that need to be met before construction starts, the plan has been given the go-ahead from the authority.

Due to the large surface area of the building, existing trees in the initial planning proposal were due to be removed.

Last year, the co-chair of Sheffield Tree Action Group had urged members of the University executive board to recognise the “ecological, public health, cultural, historical, spiritual and aesthetic value of mature trees to the community.”

The conditions of the planning permission now state the existing trees should be protected.

In response to the strike action, The University of Sheffield had previously made an offer to commit to there being no compulsory redundancies before 31 October 2026, and an additional pause on all new restructures until April 2026. This offer was declined by UCU, and has since been withdrawn.

When asked about the ‘superlab’, a UCU spokesperson said: “UCU has consistently opposed the ‘superlab’ as expensive, environmentally damaging (since its plans involved the removal of old-growth trees on the main road), and less useful than a renovation of the University’s existing labs spaces.”

The University were contacted for comment.