Share
HICKORY A water plant expansion that Hickory voters approved 20 years ago helped bring Apple's planned data center to the town of Maiden.
Apple will need large amounts of electrical power and water to operate and cool the $1 billion data center it plans to build at U.S. 321 and Startown Road.
Apple will buy about 500,000 gallons of water daily in the first few years of its operation and more than 1 million gallons daily in about 15 years if its expansion goes as planned, says Kevin Greer, Hickory's assistant public services director.
That expansion would make Apple one of Hickory's top 10 water users.
The large water plant on Lake Hickory has plenty of capacity to serve Hickory residents as well as Apple and other customers outside the city limits, Greer said. The plant can treat and pump 32 million gallons daily and currently is averaging about 12.3 million gallons per day.
“We have ample capacity,” Greer said. That extra capacity, added in the late 1980s, was vital in bringing Apple to Catawba County.
“The Apple project was possible because of the leadership and cooperation of Hickory,” Mayor Rudy Wright said.
Apple plans to build a 500,000-square-foot data facility that should open in late 2010.
Hickory ran a 36-inch water line to the Startown Road area in 2003 to serve the town of Maiden and the Startown Road industrial park where Apple will locate. Catawba County will soon start construction on 10 miles of pipe north of the Catawba-Lincoln county line that will serve the future Propst Crossroads Volunteer Fire Department, the Blackburn Landfill and the Startown Road industrial park.
The new line, with some pipes 8, 12 and 16 inches in diameter, will allow many property owners to switch from well water and will serve as a backup in case of breaks to the 36-inch line.
That redundant water service is critical to assure Apple always will have water to cool its many computer servers.
Water line work is expected to begin in October, most of it paid with $3 million in economic stimulus money from the federal government. Half that amount is a grant and half must be repaid in a zero-interest loan.
Like all customers outside the Hickory city limits, Apple's water rate will be double what customers pay who live or operate businesses inside the city. That higher rate allows new customers to help pay for expensive capital improvements that Hickory residents have been paying for over many decades.
Hickory has 900 miles of water line, with about 40 percent of that outside city limits.
Rate payers, not taxpayers, cover the operating cost of the system. Any extra money is held in reserve for expansions and repairs, Greer said.
