The show’s co-creator Terry Matalas explained this in an interview as follows:

“This was a government project that started probably in the 1960s called Project Splinter that was never really fully completed until one of our main characters, Jones, played by Barbara Sukowa, came and finished it in a last-ditch effort to save mankind,” said Matalas. “Our scientists have only recently completed it and jury-rigged it with what’s remaining in 2043 technology.”

Jury-rigged or not, the resulting machine is an impressive bit of set design — a massive behemoth of wiring, exposed circuit boards, blue lights, and something they call the “splinter chair.”

“‘Splintering’” is how we travel through time, and when it’s activated, we have some pretty incredible lighting effects that come through,” explained Matalas. “It’s sort of like the Hadron Collider meets a wormhole emitter.” (And if you can picture that, chances are you’re in the show’s target market.)

The Project Splinter team and the time traveling machine reside in what is referred to as the Temporal Facility, formerly known as the Raritan National Laboratory.