Caroline will remove industrial needs from water application

November 17, 2024

by Cathy Dyson, Free Lance-Star; Fredericksburg.com

The Caroline County Board of Supervisors dealt with two major issues regarding

water and data centers Thursday night, with little discussion on either during

the public portion of the meeting.

After a closed session, Chairman Jeff Black announced the board is directing staff to remove industrial cooling from the county’s application for a water intake project. Caroline has requested permission from the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality to withdraw a maximum of 13.9 million gallons of water a day from the Rappahannock River.

Caroline officials have maintained that the need for drinking water motivated them to put forward the project. But residents of Caroline and other localities up and down the Rappahannock, including State Sen. Richard Stuart, have maintained the county wants the water for industrial and commercial purposes, not residential.

The county’s announcement to withdraw the industrial portion from the permit came at the end of the meeting, after which the board immediately adjourned.

Earlier in its almost five-hour session, Caroline supervisors approved a resolution

with the Spotsylvania County Board of Supervisors concerning the Mattameade Tech Campus, which would include 11 data centers in both counties.

Most of the facilities would be in the Woodford area of Caroline, off Orrock Lane, with Spotsylvania’s portion off Stonewall Jackson Road.

The Economic Growth Sharing Agreement, which the Spotsylvania Board of Supervisors approved on Tuesday, is subject to public hearings and will be submitted to the Commission on Local Government.

The agreement calls for Spotsylvania to provide the water for the data centers which

would be operated by Amazon Data Services, according to performance agreements both counties signed earlier this year.

The resolution between the two counties has been a long time coming, Black said on Thursday. After he announced the topic under new business, another board member tried to make a motion to approve it, but Black had something to say first.

“Finally. Finally. Finally,” he repeated, then added: “It was five years ago that we

started this process with Amazon and Spotsylvania, and I know there are some people who thought this wasn’t going to happen, and we were wondering if it was actually going forward, (but) the water is being provided and not by us.”

The agreement states that Spotsylvania will provide water, wastewater, recycled water and sewer services to the Mattameade complex. In exchange, the counties will share the tax revenue generated with Caroline getting 57.5% of the total and Spotsylvania, 42.5%.

Spotsylvania staff said that its share would amount to $371.1 million over 40 years,

the expected term of the agreement. Under the formula the counties agreed to, that would mean $502 million in tax revenue for Caroline during the same timeframe.

As for Caroline’s request regarding water from the Rappahannock, its application

reveals how much industrial water the county was hoping to get.

Initial projections call for an average of 2.92 million gallons of water a day by 2028.

At that point, industrial needs would account for 0.75 million gallons a day while

residential needs would require 0.96 million gallons a day, according to Caroline’s

application.

The application also stated three industrial projects would be online by 2039 and that water would be needed to cool them.

Within four years of buildout of these projects, Caroline would need an average of

7.73 million gallons of water a day and a maximum of more than 13 million gallons

daily. At that time, the demand for industrial water would exceed that for residential needs.

The application shows an estimated 2.88 million gallons of water daily for industrial purposes and 2.85 million gallons of water daily for county homes. That’s under the projection for average daily demand.

In addition to removing the industrial cooling from the application, Caroline has to

provide DEQ more information on other impacts the intake facility would have. On Oct. 25, DEQ sent the county a letter, giving it 60 days to address how much the salinity level of the Rappahannock can change before it affects beneficial uses

downstream.

Those uses range from farming and protecting fish and wildlife to recreation,

navigation and cultural and aesthetic values.

This article originally appeared in The Free Lance-Star. Click Here for Original Article