WHEELING — U.S. Sen. Shelley Moore Capito on Friday took in the views from atop Vineyard Hill, shopped at the Wheeling Artisan Center and marveled at the science and technology at the Touchstone Research Laboratory during stops in the Wheeling area on Friday.

At Touchstone, she saw projects contracted by the U.S. Department of Defense and. the U.S. Navy. Some of these utilize CFOAM, a material made from coal by-products.

But Touchstone also is home to MetPreg — billed as the “world’s strongest aluminum” and now used in the repair of war vessels. It’s also a light material, and has applications that can be used on rocket ships.

“It’s the wave of the future,” Capito, R-W.Va., said. “Soon we’ll be fighting wars in space.

“We’ve learned a lot about the need to strengthen materials, and make them lighter, and make things go farther and more efficiently. That’s what they’re doing here — and they’re using coal. This is the life of coal in the future. I think it’s exciting.”

Capito is a member of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, which has provided funding for many of the projects worked on at Touchstone.

MetPreg is a product requested by the U.S. Navy. Brian Joseph, president and CEO of Touchstone, provided her with a presentation of MetPreg on Friday.

“We’ve helped them with the materials requested by the Navy for repair and strengthening,” Capito said. “I would be proud to be on a vessel that Touchstone has invented something that keeps that vessel operating another 20-30-40 years. I think it’s really neat.”

Capito began the day in New Cumberland and the grand opening of Hancock County’s new Health Center Building before venturing to Wheeling.

At Cliff House on Vineyard Hill, she met with representatives from Grow Ohio Valley. She said the group has an “ambitious and very wonderful” vision of how to connect youth with growing their own food and caring for their own environment.

She also noticed all the activity taking place in downtown Wheeling.

“It’s really great to see,” Capito said. “As somebody who visited Wheeling as a little girl, I always thought it was just the coolest place. It shows that the leadership here has great vision for what Wheeling can be in the future.”

She noted the federal government has helped Grow Ohio Valley with its plans for growth, and assisted downtown Wheeling in achieving its vision by providing funding for the downtown streetscape project that is presently underway downtown.

“These are ways I can see what the completion of those projects can be once those federal dollars go in,” Capito explained.

She remembers Wheeling as a thriving industrial town in her childhood. Now that the industry has gone, she calls much of what is left today “beautiful old bones of buildings and green spaces.”

“But it takes a lot to maintain it — it takes economic vibrancy,” Capito said.