An incredible year of milestones for Stowe
2024 was an action-packed year for the Stowe Regional Water Resource Recovery Facility (Stowe RWRRF) project teams! From breaking ground on new projects to strong community partnerships, we've made incredible progress. Here’s a look back at some of the year's key achievements.
Construction Highlights
In 2024, we made major strides on the Stowe RWRRF, hitting key milestones including:
So far, we’ve poured 25,000 cubic yards of concrete—nearly half of the 50,000 cubic yards needed for the entire Stowe RWRRF project. For context, each truckload carries 10 cubic yards of concrete, meaning almost 2,500 truckloads have been brought to the site and poured!
Highlights from this year’s work include:
Mount Holly Pump Station
This year, we completed work on the Mount Holly Pump Station, including the electrical building, backup generator, Parshall flume, yard piping, valves, sidewalks and access roads. The four pumps have also been installed. This pump station is a key part of manage our water resources regionally.
Additionally, significant progress has been made on the wastewater pipelines, which are now connected to the future Stowe Influent Headworks and awaiting test approvals. These pipelines will carry wastewater flows from Mount Holly, running deep under the Catawba River to the Stowe facility for treatment.
The pump station will be fully operational in 2025!
Stowe Headworks & Influent Pump Station at Long Creek Pump Station
At Long Creek, we've completed equalization basin cells #1 and #2, which can each hold nine million gallons of water, adding an additional 18 million gallons of storage capacity to Stowe RWRRF. This boosts the facility's storage capacity to 29 million gallons, up from 11 million from the existing tanks on site. These massive basins required 4,070 cubic yards of concrete—about twice the volume of an Olympic-sized swimming pool.
Additionally, at the Headworks and Influent Pump Station, we've poured about 9,000 out of 11,862 cubic yards of concrete – that’s enough concrete to fill than three Olympic-sized swimming pools! To keep the pump station running during construction, we’ve installed a new pump that will divert water to Paw Creek while we reroute existing infrastructure.
New Bridge and Driveway
Bridge Construction Complete!
This year, we successfully completed the new bridge and access road! The bridge spans 250 feet across Long Creek to connect the Long Creek Pump Station and the new Stowe Facility. The bridge is 50 feet wide and features a separated multi-use path for bicycles and pedestrians that follows along the new access driveway.
A key component of the Stowe Community Benefit Project, the multi-use path will be an outdoor recreation amenity for our neighbors and provide a unique opportunity to see views of Long Creek and surrounding nature.
Access Driveway
The new access driveway is about one mile long from Belmeade Drive to Long Creek. It opened this year for all construction traffic to reach the Stowe Facility construction site and Long Creek Pump Station. Following along the driveway, the paved multi-use path will allow pedestrians and bicyclists to enjoy scenic views of preserved greenspace.
Stowe Facility
This year, we broke ground on several critical buildings at the Stowe Facility, including the administration, maintenance, chemical, UV and filter buildings. We also broke ground on the biological nutrient removal distribution structure and the primary sludge pump station electrical building. We’re also near completion of the primary and final clarifiers, which will be among the largest in the industry.
So far, for the new Stowe Facility alone, we've poured approximately 25,000 cubic yards of concrete, with 35,000 cubic yards expected by the project's completion.
Belmont Pump Station
We are currently designing a project to move wastewater from Belmont’s service area to Charlotte Water's collection and treatment system. The project includes a five-million-gallon equalization basin and three-million-gallon per day pump station in Gaston County, two 30-inch wastewater pipelines approximately one mile underneath the Catawba River, and approximately 1.25 miles of 24-inch wastewater pipelines in Mecklenburg County.
The alignment has been adjusted to reduce environmental impacts during and after construction. A section of the wastewater pipeline in Mecklenburg County was accelerated to match the schedule of a developer adjacent to the pipeline alignment. Installation of this section during development construction will be less expensive for ratepayers and less disruptive to new residents.
Regional Solids Transfer Project
In December, we broke ground on the Regional Solids Transfer Facility, which is part of Charlotte Water's efforts to regionalize its solids treatment program. Currently, solids are being pumped off-site to the McAlpine Wastewater Treatment Plant.
Technical Deep Dive: Biological Nutrient Removal (BNR) Basin
One of the standout features of Stowe RWRRF is our state-of-the-art Biological Nutrient Removal (BNR) basin. This advanced system uses five stages of biological treatment to remove excess nutrients like nitrogen and phosphorus—key pollutants that can harm aquatic life in the Catawba River.
At the heart of this process is the Densified Activated Sludge (DAS) technology, which forms dense sludge granules that settle faster, improving treatment efficiency.
By optimizing the settling process, DAS reduces infrastructure costs and minimizes the energy and chemical needs of traditional systems. It’s expected to save up to $20 million in infrastructure costs when the facility reaches full capacity, processing 25 million gallons of wastewater daily.
Feature Articles:
NC Currents Magazine
This spring, NC Current’s magazine article, “Breaking Boundaries, Transforming Communities: Pioneering a Collaborative Approach to Regional Wastewater Management,” explored the backstory behind Charlotte Water’s commitment to team up with the Cities of Belmont and Mount Holly to construct Stowe RWRRF. Read more about how from the project’s inception, public input and an open flow of communication between the people and their government has been instrumental in developing the design of a project of this magnitude.
“The facility is named after Joseph R. Stowe Jr., a figure synonymous with innovation and leadership in the water and wastewater industry.”
Wastewater Digest Magazine
Stowe RWRRF was also featured in Wastewater Digest magazine’s July/August issue in an article titled “This is the Largest Project in Charlotte Water’s History.” All those with an interest in engineering will enjoy reading about Stowe RWRRF’s use of Horizontal Directional Drilling (HDD) to install new wastewater pipelines through bedrock located deep under the Catawba River.
“Stowe RWRRF’s enhanced cleaning technology will achieve near drinking quality water levels for the water that is released back into the Catawba River. This will have a beneficial impact on the growing ecotourism industry in the area, including boating, rafting and kayaking, allowing the public to benefit from scenic natural surroundings while pursuing water sports.”
Then, in the September/October issue of its magazine, Wastewater Digest published a second article about Stowe RWRRF called “Demystifying the Engineering Process of Charlotte Water’s Largest Project Yet.” Check it out to hear how Charlotte Water has made great strides in reaching the next generation of scholars and inspiring them to consider pursuing careers in science, engineering, technology and mathematics.
Water Energy & Technology (WE&T)
Water, Environment & Technology magazine’s September issue published a Stowe RWRRF article called “Community-First Construction” that tackled the topic of how the structure for Stowe RWRRF’s Community Benefit Project (CBP) emerged. It proves Charlotte Water’s community outreach to obtain ideas for the CBP was anything but shallow! Swim through the history of how we formed a Community Stakeholder Committee in 2019 to understand the public’s desires for the CBP and how we sought insights from those who lived and worked in the project community, including school staff members, elected officials, Catawba Indian Nation representatives and nonprofit employees. See why many desired to use the 90 natural acres Charlotte Water was preserving at the project site in a way that would allow children and adults alike to step back from our technology-based lifestyles and connect with the natural world.
“The community provided more than 450 survey responses and 13 unique ideas, with themes centering on preserving the natural landscape of the tranquil area and increasing access to outdoor spaces for recreation and education.”
American Infrastructure Magazine
An October article in American Infrastructure magazine titled “Public Works Water Maintenance Practices: Stowe RWRRF Showcases Government Commitment to Sustainability and Collaboration,” dives into the reasons behind why Stowe RWRRF needed to be built. These included a booming Charlotte population and a desire to reduce the 27-mile route it previously took to pump wastewater from North Charlotte to Pineville by more than half to decrease energy consumption and lessen the risk of environmentally harmful wastewater spills.
“If they were to remain operational, each facility would need to undergo complex and expensive upgrades to increase capacity and meet strict environmental regulations.”
Informed Infrastructure
Closing out the year, Informed Infrastructure’s December issue provides a deep dive into the engineering and treatment technologies in "New Charlotte Water Facility Meets Stringent Standards." Learn about cutting-edge techniques like Biological Nutrient Removal and Densified Activated Sludge in this immersive article.
“A key aspect of Stowe RWRRF will be its implementation of the latest technologies and cutting-edge treatment techniques to more effectively clean and purify wastewater,” says Shull. “It will achieve this goal through embracing a modern densified activated sludge (DAS) biological nutrient removal (BNR) process to decrease nutrient discharges—primarily nitrogen and phosphorus—into the Catawba River.”
Community Connections
We’ve had a busy year engaging with schools, industry professionals, and the local community. Some of the events we’ve been involved in include:
Looking Ahead
Here’s what’s coming up in 2025:
Mount Holly Pump Station: Set to begin service in the summer of 2025. This pump station will transfer Mount Holly’s wastewater (approximately 2-3 million gallons per day) under the Catawba River to Charlotte Water for further treatment.
Long Creek Pump Station: Plan to complete the generator building, which will provide backup power for the entire site.
Stowe Facility: Expect to complete the administration building, maintenance building, and BNR basin, and continue progress on other structures.
Regional Solids Transfer Project: Plan to begin construction on the wastewater pipelines.
Belmont Pump Station: Plan to begin horizontal directional drilling for the wastewater pipelines under the Catawba River.