Brunswick County is providing an update on the expansion and water treatment upgrades project at the Northwest Water Treatment Plant as of June 2025.
Despite efforts from the County to provide the project contractor with support, the contractor has not successfully completed the tasks necessary to meet the schedule the contractor provided to the County that indicated dates of early spring 2025 for expanded capacity and late spring 2025 for the reverse osmosis (RO) treatment system.
Due to the project contractor’s repeated failures in meeting its performance milestones, the County provided notice to the contractor and the surety directing the contractor to ensure prompt completion of the work, and subsequently provided an additional notice to the contractor and its surety requesting the surety take over the work and complete the performance of the subject contract.
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.
Brunswick County does not have an estimated date of when it will receive the new project schedule, but county leadership is emphasizing the need for vigilance and timeliness in its development as well as in setting a realistic and responsible completion date. The County anticipates receiving an updated schedule during the summer and will publish the new estimated project schedule as soon as it is available.
“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,” County Manager Steve Stone said. “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 delays do not mean that all work has stopped at the project site, but rather that key project milestones have not been met and that the overall project completion date has continued to move into the future. The most recently completed efforts over the past few months are listed below.
Brunswick County recognizes that several community members are interested in this project and want to know the latest percentage complete. Brunswick County will provide an update on the estimated completion rate for remaining project milestones when the new schedule is published.
There are no expected impacts to the original project cost of $167.3 million. Brunswick County intends to deduct liquidated damages from the project cost due to the contractor’s delays, with current estimates around $3.5 million (this amount is subject to change based on present or future factors).
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.
Recently Completed Project Tasks
- Now Complete – Permanent Power Feed to New Reverse Osmosis Building: Crews have fully energized the building where the new reverse osmosis system is located to support electrical needs for the new RO treatment skids.
- Now Complete – New Raw Water Transmission Main: This new transition main will pull water from the Cape Fear River straight to the water plant for processing and eventual treatment through the RO system.
- Now Complete – New Generator System: The new generator system is now online, which will provide redundant/back-up power to the full plant including the RO system in the event of a power outage.
- Now Complete – All Residual Systems: The entirety of the residual systems (east and west clarifiers, sludge thickeners, and pumps) are now fully operational. The east clarifier came online earlier this year, and the west clarifier came online in the spring. Clarifiers work to remove solids from water by permitting heavier and larger particles to settle to the bottom of the tank, allowing the clean water to be collected at the top and proceed through the rest of the treatment process.
- Now Testing – Advanced Chlorine System: Subcontractor crews and county staff are currently conducting tests on the advanced chlorine system, which is an important step in the conventional and RO treatment processes.
- Previously Completed – Conventional Rapid Mixing: Both the east and west conventional rapid mix processes are complete and are now a permanent part of the treatment process as of early 2025. Rapid mixing is one of the first steps in the treatment process and involves mixing a coagulant into raw water to destabilize particles and allows them to clump (flocculate) and later filter out during the sedimentation phase.
About the Project
Brunswick County has been concerned about the presence of PFAS in our drinking water since 2017 when news broke that the Cape Fear River had been contaminated by GenX and other per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) as a result of releases from Chemours’ Fayetteville Works facility. The County immediately began seeking solutions to remove PFAS compounds from our drinking water. The reverse osmosis system being installed is considered the most effective treatment system to remove PFAS compounds from drinking water.
There are two core parts of the project: One is a major expansion effort to increase the amount of water that can be treated at the plant by an additional 12 million gallons per day (MGD) to accommodate future growth in the water system; the other part is the installation of a low-pressure reverse osmosis water treatment system to remove PFAS compounds from our drinking water. Once completed, the Northwest Water Treatment Plant will be one of the largest reverse osmosis water treatment plants in the nation with the capacity to treat more than 36 million gallons of water per day using RO.
All of Brunswick County's water customers and wholesale* municipal water customers receive either all or part of their water from the Northwest Water Treatment Plant. If your property/home receives a water bill from any of these entities, then you will benefit from the low-pressure reverse osmosis treatment system being installed at the plant: Brunswick County Utility Billing, Village of Bald Head Island, Town of Holden Beach, Town of Oak Island, Town of Ocean Isle Beach.
Brunswick County also joined other utilities in the region to sue DuPont and Chemours. The County is seeking monetary damages from Chemours to hold it responsible for the millions of dollars it is spending to install a new treatment system necessary to remove PFAS contaminants. The lawsuit remains active and ongoing.
To learn more about PFAS and how to reduce your exposure, visit the Understanding PFAS webpage on the NC Department of Environmental Quality’s website. Brunswick County also has information on its weekly PFAS testing process, opportunities for private drinking water wells to test for PFAS, and answers to frequently asked questions on our GenX/PFAS Information webpage.
Individuals can learn more about the Northwest Water Treatment Plant Expansion and Reverse Osmosis Treatment Upgrades Project at brunswickcountync.gov/nwtp.
* Within the Southport, St. James, Oak Island, and Caswell Beach areas, water from the Northwest Water Treatment is blended with water from the Highway 211 Water Treatment Plant to serve customers. St. James receives primarily groundwater from the 211 Water Treatment Plant but receives blended water between both plants during the peak times of the year or when the 211 Water Treatment Plant is being serviced. The Highway 211 Water Treatment Plant sources its water from groundwater wells. Bald Head Island has its own treatment plant, but supplementary water is supplied by the 211 Water Treatment Plant, or blended water from both county plants. All other customers in the County’s service area receive their water solely from the Northwest Water Treatment Plant.