WASHINGTON — Today, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced a $52 million Water Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act (WIFIA) loan to the City of Pflugerville, Texas, to support its Water Treatment Plant Expansion Project. With this WIFIA loan, EPA is helping to increase how much drinking water the plant can treat and making the water safer to drink through new treatment and filtration technology.
“Congratulations to the City of Pflugerville on closing the first WIFIA loan in the State of Texas,” said EPA Assistant Administrator for Water Radhika Fox. “With this loan, the EPA is providing the City of Pflugerville with low-cost financing to undertake critical upgrades to their drinking water system that serves 76,000 residents.”
The Water Treatment Plant Expansion project will increase the City of Pflugerville’s drinking water system’s capacity to meet projected demand from 17.7 million gallons per day to 30 million gallons per day. To address water quality concerns and protect public health, the city will upgrade drinking water infrastructure and utilize new pretreatment and filtration technologies to enhance the system’s disinfection process and help meet EPA standards. Overall, these improvements will help the system comply with regulatory requirements, enhance overall system resiliency, and meet projected water demand through 2050.
“I'm monumentally excited about this project and our strategic funding strategies because it delivers what the residents deserve for clean water at a great price,” said Brandon Pritchett, Public Utility Director, City of Pflugerville. “While we have to do a lot of work to get there, it delivers a project that the ratepayers deserve, and a clean product that's going to be resilient and robust for the next 30 years.”
By financing with a WIFIA loan, the City of Pflugerville will save over $13 million and will be able to accelerate other capital improvement projects for its drinking water system. Construction is expected to be completed in 2023, and construction and operation are estimated to create approximately 325 jobs. Through WIFIA and $50 billion through the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, EPA is working to deliver the benefits of water infrastructure improvements to communities across the country.
Background
Established by the Water Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act of 2014, the WIFIA program is a federal loan and guarantee program administered by EPA. The WIFIA program’s aim is to accelerate investment in the nation’s water infrastructure by providing long-term, low-cost supplemental credit assistance for regionally and nationally significant projects.
The WIFIA program has an active pipeline of pending applications for projects that will result in billions of dollars in water infrastructure investment and thousands of jobs. With this WIFIA loan closing, EPA has announced 93 WIFIA loans that are providing $16 billion in credit assistance to help finance over $34 billion for water infrastructure while creating 103,000 jobs and saving ratepayers $5.5 billion.
EPA is currently accepting letters of interest for WIFIA and SWIFIA loans. In June, EPA announced the availability of $5.5 billion under the 2022 WIFIA Notice of Funding Availability and an additional $1 billion under the State Infrastructure Financing Authority WIFIA (SWIFIA) program. Together, this newly available funding will support more than $13 billion in water infrastructure projects while creating more than 40,000 jobs. Learn more about submitting a letter of interest for a WIFIA or SWIFIA loan.
from EPA News Releases https://ift.tt/t92I1kY