The long-awaited reverse osmosis system designed to remove PFAS from Brunswick County Public Utilities’ drinking water supply will not be operational in the time frame originally announced.
County officials announced that, because the project contractor has repeatedly failed to meet its performance milestones, expanded capacity and the reverse osmosis, or RO, treatment system at the Northwest Water Treatment Plant will not be up and running by the start of summer, which officially begins Friday.
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“We recognize that this is not the news that people wanted to hear, but it is an important and very much needed step to getting this project over the finish line,” Brunswick County Manager Steve Stone said in a news release. “This is the largest project in Brunswick County’s history, and we have to make sure it is done right. Our community has waited too long already to get a solution to removing PFAS from our water supply, and we felt this was the best step to getting our RO treatment system online as soon as possible.”
The upgraded treatment system will remove per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, including GenX, and 1,4-dioxane from the plant’s water source, the Cape Fear River.
The plant’s capacity is being doubled from 24 million gallons per day to 48 million gallons per day.
Work is continuing at the project site, but the completion date of that work “has continued to move into the future,” according to the release.
The county has directed the contractor and the surety to “ensure prompt completion of the work” and requested that the surety “take over the work and complete the performance” of the contract.
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“Through this process, County staff, professional consultants and surety representatives will evaluate the remaining tasks in the project, develop a new completion schedule, and identify contractors as needed to finish the final tasks to ensure completion of the overall project as timely and effectively as possible,” according to the release.
The county does not have an estimated date of when it will receive a new project schedule, but anticipated receiving one “during the summer.” That schedule will be published as soon as it is available and the county will provide an update on the estimated completion of the remaining project milestones.
The delay is not expected to impact the original project cost of $167.3 million. The county plans to deduct an estimated $3.5 million in liquidated damages from that cost because of the delays. That amount may change “based on present or future factors,” according to the release.
The county does not plan to increase customer rates because of the delays.
The most recently completed efforts over the past few months are listed below. There are also no increases planned for any water customers’ rates due to these delays or the upcoming work that will take place to finalize a new project schedule.
