North Carolina approves $80M loan for Clayton sewage plant
(The Center Square) – North Carolina has approved an $80 million loan for a town of Clayton sewage treatment facility.
The revolving loan approved by the state’s Local Government Commission (LGC) this week will allow the town to construct a sewage treatment plant to accommodate population growth as long as Clayton and its two major industrial users reach an agreement on protecting ratepayers.
“This is a significant milestone for the Town of Clayton,” interim Town Manager Rich Cappola said. “With these funds, we will be able to move forward with finalizing commitments and stay on schedule with the construction of our new Water Reclamation Facility project.”
U.S. Census Bureau data shows Clayton’s population increased by 79% from 2010 to 2020. Clayton’s population grew from 16,116 residents in 2010 to 28,843 in 2020. The plant is being built to provide service to a facility for Danish drugmaker Novo Nordisk, pharmaceutical company Grifols Therapeutics and other companies in the area. Novo Nordisk and Grifols Therapeutics companies require water for operations.
The Novo Nordisk facility is slated to foster $2 billion in economic benefits in Clayton, state economic officials said. Grifols Therapeutics’ recent expansion of its Clayton facility is projected to generate more than $350 million in economic benefits for the area, officials said.
The new plant replaces the Little Creek facility and will provide a treatment capacity of up to 6 million gallons a day, with the ability to expand to 10 million gallons daily. The project and other related work will cost the town about $175 million.
The LCG approved the loan Tuesday under the condition Clayton, Novo Nordisk and Grifols Therapeutics sign final contracts by Oct. 15. The contracts must specify their financial obligations and include how they will protect ratepayers from excessive rate increases if the need for wastewater treatment decreases or fades.
The LGC approved a $12 million loan in October to help with the design and engineering of the Clayton wastewater treatment plant, which was estimated to cost $125 million at the time.
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