The State Water Infrastructure Authority has approved more than $300 million in loans and grants, its largest funding round thus far, to help North Carolina towns pay for 156 drinking water and wastewater projects. In September 2016, with $308 million in funding available, the authority received applications totaling more than $400 million in requested funding.
“These projects produce vital, multi-faceted results for our state,” said Michael S. Regan, secretary of the N.C. Department of Environmental Quality, or DEQ. “Water quality improvement, public health protection and increased economic growth are not fully possible without reliable water infrastructure. Today and tomorrow, this funding will improve the daily lives of North Carolinians.”
To meet the need for rehabilitation and modernization of water systems in North Carolina that are, in some cases, more than a century old, the authority recently introduced two new types of grants.
The popular Asset Inventory and Assessment (AIA) grants are used for inventory and documentation of existing systems. The Merger/Regionalization Feasibility (MRF) grants fund studies for evaluation of the potential consolidation of two or more systems into one and the potential physical interconnection with another system.
“We have seen a big response to the new AIA grants,” said Kim Colson, director of DEQ’s water infrastructure division. “With a focus on inventory and assessment, towns receiving these funds will now be able to address their challenging infrastructure needs in a structured, future-focused way.”
As an example of just how outdated some infrastructure is, one city discovered that their waterline and sewer maps were linen maps stored on wooden scrolls. These funds will allow towns and cities to replace infrastructure that in some cases dates back to the early 1900s.
Monies for this round are awarded through the Community Develop Block Grant-Infrastructure program, the Drinking Water State Revolving Fund loan program, Drinking Water State Reserve program, Clean Water State Revolving Fund loan program, and the Wastewater State Reserve program.
A summary of funding approved by the authority and a list all of the funded projects statewide is available at this link: http://portal.ncdenr.org/c/document_library/get_file?uuid=cf984389-90c7-4876-a4d8-c56521fb4ba8&groupId=14655572