Our customers have been talking about and asking vital questions regarding the water supply in our valley. We care deeply about this future, too. In fact, ensuring long-term water security is the primary reason that community leaders formed the Western Virginia Water Authority 22 years ago. Our decisions are rooted in decades of proven historical data, not guesswork, forming the foundation for how we protect and plan the region’s water assets.
To provide greater transparency, the Authority recently launched a new reservoir level dashboard on our website. While we have posted daily updates for years, tracking “feet below full pond” and “percentage remaining” for our two primary reservoirs, this new tool allows the public to view our data across a complete chronological record. For the curious citizen, this means water data can now be explored and compared year-to-year against historical weather events.
Water does not move on its own. It requires the dedication of talented professionals who manage, treat, distribute and collect this valuable resource. The team at the Authority is deeply committed to this valley and its citizens. We live, work, and play here alongside you (and we drink the water, too!). As public servants, we bear a dual responsibility: ensuring reliable, clean drinking water for our community today, and safely discharging treated water back into the river for tomorrow.
Balancing growth with existing commitments
Before any new customer connects to our system, we must ensure that the addition will not conflict with our responsibility to serve existing residents and businesses. It is entirely reasonable to ask whether a major development, like a data center, will impact your personal water supply— especially during a persistent drought.
This local conversation is happening amid a broader national discussion regarding data centers, resource allocation, and the rights of localities and property owners to make their own land-use decisions. These are the exact same resource questions we ask internally every time a new project proposes joining our system.
A guiding principle that informs all Authority expansions is simple: development pays for development. We are committed to ensuring that a new subdivision, apartment complex or commercial facility never creates negative service impacts for our current customers or our environment. When infrastructure upgrades are required to accommodate growth, those costs fall strictly on the developer. This is a core element of how Google and the Authority have agreed to proceed.
There is misinformation being spread that recent infrastructure projects were sized for this project. This is simply not true. The Authority is finishing up a five-year, $20 million plan of improvements for Botetourt County, including a new water pumping station near Hollins University that will be operational in July, completed pipe installations along Sanderson Road and U.S. Routes 11 and 220 North, a completed crossing of Interstate 81 and new pipe along Tinker Mountain Road. This last improvement will provide a second, redundant feed to the Authority’s Botetourt Commons Water Pumping Station. These projects are for the benefit of our current customers and would have happened even if Google had not made an announcement to come to Botetourt.
While our region has never faced a single project with this specific scale of infrastructure impact, the underlying engineering and financial mechanics work the same, and always in the interest of the public. Because projects of this magnitude leave generational footprints, the Authority’s board of directors felt it was vital to establish a long-term funding relationship directly with Botetourt County, rather than a private corporation, ensuring accountability remains local.
The science behind our resources
We understand and appreciate the concerns raised by the exposed shorelines at Carvins Cove as drought conditions persist across Virginia and nearly half the nation. However, our historical data shows we have navigated these dry cycles before. We are confident we can safely supply the project’s initial maximum day demand because our system has already proven its capacity during similar climate constraints.
Furthermore, we want to directly address questions regarding whether increased surface water usage from Carvins Cove could negatively impact nearby groundwater and residential wells.
Carvins Cove is fed exclusively by surface water sources and 12,000 acres of drainage within the Natural Reserve watershed. Our data shows no connection between the reservoir’s water levels and local groundwater tables.
Physical science bears this out through entirely distinct water chemistry profiles:
- Carvins Cove Surface Water: Consists of a hardness of 53 parts per million (ppm), alkalinity of 39 ppm, and iron levels of 0.024 ppm.
- Greenfield Area Groundwater/Wells: Consists of a hardness of 688 ppm, alkalinity of 295 ppm, and iron levels of 0.4 ppm.
These are fundamentally different water bodies. The Authority maintains a vested interest in sustainable groundwater; we manage more than one hundred wells across the region to balance our supplies and maintain resiliency. The Botetourt Center at Greenfield has been served by Carvins Cove since shortly after Botetourt joined the Authority. This is a practical matter of geography, mechanics and physics.
We have heard questions about where the wastewater from a data center will go. Google will connect their facilities in Greenfield to the existing sanitary sewer collection system in the park, which takes all wastewater to the Roanoke Regional Water Pollution Control Plant located at Brownlee Avenue along the Roanoke River. Google, like other businesses in the valley, must meet strict pretreatment requirements before being allowed to discharge into the sewer system (including temperature).
The Authority is not only responsible for ensuring that the region’s wastewater is treated to permit requirements before discharge, but we do so in a way that removes more than 100,000 pounds of pollution every day. In fact, the water that is discharged into the Roanoke River after being treated at the Roanoke Regional Water Pollution Control Plant has less bacteria and pollutants that water that naturally flows down the river. We are studying the feasibility of re-using this water for nonpotable commercial and industrial use in the region.
Planning for the next 30 years
The pursuit of regional water security is precisely what led to the Authority’s creation in 2004 following the historic drought of 2001–2002. Look at what has changed for the better since that crisis:
- Regional Management: Our leaders recognized that nature does not care about political boundaries on a map. By managing resources regionally, we align our infrastructure with natural watersheds.
- Infrastructure Investment: Millions have been invested in upgrading reservoirs, treatment plants, pump stations, and pipe networks to build systemic redundancy.
- Increased Efficiency: Although the Authority has expanded to include customers in Botetourt, Franklin and Vinton, our region uses roughly the same amount of water today as it did 20 years ago. Thanks to proactive leak detection and wiser residential water habits, per-capita usage has actually declined.
We do not plan in isolation. Virginia requires regional water planning under a strict framework administered by the Department of Environmental Quality. Following a 2024 modernization of this state program, our region is currently developing an updated water supply plan due in 2029. This plan will inventory sources, project demand for 30 years into the future, and map out what solutions are viable. This is not a simple water engineer’s exercise, as it considers local comprehensive planning and zoning, population projections and all manner of nonmunicipal water applications such as agriculture, irrigation, nonagricultural self-supplied users, to name a few.
True water security relies on a diversified portfolio. We are evaluating a wide array of long-term strategies, including the “Lake Loop” interconnectivity concept, nonpotable water reuse, further groundwater development, new surface water development, structural rehabilitation of the 98-year-old Carvins Cove Dam and potentially reactivating treatment capabilities at the Beaverdam and Falling Creek reservoirs. Water supply planning is a highly localized and unique undertaking for each area. What works in eastern Virginia may not work in Roanoke. We study successes and challenges across the state and country and bring those lessons learned into our own local planning.
An uncertain climate, a certain commitment
While the future is impossible to predict perfectly, meteorologists point toward a climate of “wetter wets and drier dries” for our region. Intense rainfall events mixed with longer periods of drought alter the organic loading of our raw water, impacting treatability. Rainfall patterns may become more intense, more dispersed over time and have more drought in between. While Carvins Cove is sitting low today, in this future we need to consider what to do with rainfall when the reservoir is already full, or how to manage wide-ranging water quality. How should the region further adapt to flood-inducing rainfall?
As this vital work continues, the Authority looks forward to robust, open conversations with community stakeholders. We have hosted a number of public conversations over the past year and will be hosting more soon. The public will be invited to actively participate as our regional water plans develop over the coming years, and we encourage you to stay informed via our website and digital channels.
Our commitment is to deliver a secure water future for our region. We intend to carry forward the legacy of the community leaders who came before us — choosing to plant trees in whose shade we may never sit. By carefully studying the data, reflecting on our history and applying rigorous technical experience, we are entirely confident we can build certain solutions for an uncertain future. We hope you’ll join us on this journey.
Will Bulloss is chief strategy officer for the Western Virginia Water Authority.
