Roanoke Mayor Joe Cobb has asked Botetourt County to give the city 15% of the annual tax revenue generated by the future Google data center and to replace the water that will be used by the project, citing Roanoke’s “historic contribution” to the regional water authority and fears that the data center’s water demands could have a negative impact on recreation at Carvins Cove.
Botetourt County says it already planned to do all those things. The board of supervisors this month approved a plan for water replacement, and the county has paid $450,000 to the Western Virginia Water Authority to start that process. That plan was a “good neighbor policy” on Botetourt’s part and has been in the works since early this year, said Gary Larrowe, Botetourt County administrator.
“Roanoke County and the city gave their facilities to the water authority, and so once you become a member you should have access to those resources that are for a combined member,” Larrowe said Wednesday. “However, we also realize that we needed to actually make sure that there is a water supply in the future.”
On June 20, Google closed a $14 million deal with Botetourt County for 312 acres in Greenfield Industrial Park, where it plans to house a data center. Google has not publicly released a timeline for the project or any information about how large the data center will be.
Data centers require a large quantity of water to cool down their equipment. The Google data center will become the water authority’s largest customer, Mike McEvoy, the authority’s executive director, said Wednesday.
The agreement between Botetourt and the water authority that lays out this plan states that the replacement will start at two million gallons of water per day, increasing to eight million gallons per day at some point in the future, based on possible future expansions by Google.
The water authority treats 19 million gallons of drinking water a day, with the capacity to treat 56 million gallons per day, according to its website.
According to the agreement, Botetourt’s maximum financial obligation is 100% of all costs of the water supply project, up to $100 million, and at lower percentages up to $400 million. McEvoy said Botetourt could see costs like this if the need for a completely new reservoir arose.
The agreement also lays out $8 million in specific, near-term payments by the county into a fund that would pay for the water authority to develop new water sources.
That agreement is near getting approval from the water authority, McEvoy said. 
Roanoke and Roanoke County’s stake in the water authority
Roanoke transferred ownership of the Carvins Cove reservoir to the authority in 2004, when the authority was created in partnership with Roanoke County. The city retains ownership and responsibility for the surrounding park, including maintaining and funding all land above the waterline.
The authority pulls water from three other reservoirs in addition to Carvins Cove: Spring Hollow, Beaverdam Creek and Falling Creek.
Over the last 20 years, Franklin County, Botetourt County, the town of Boones Mill and the town of Vinton also consolidated their water operations into the authority. Additionally, the town of Fincastle contracts with the authority for services.
Cobb’s June 9 letter to Larrowe and Amy White, chair of the Botetourt County Board of Supervisors, addressed a number of concerns and requested the 15% revenue share.
“The City of Roanoke is supportive in principle of efforts to ensure increased water service for Greenfield Business Park,” reads the letter, which was obtained by Cardinal News. “However, for Roanoke to formally support the proposed arrangement, City Council and City staff have identified several concerns that we believe must be addressed to ensure the long-term sustainability and fairness of any agreement.”
Cobb said he’s concerned that the city is “giving away” a major asset: Carvins Cove.
He said Tuesday that while he supports the Google project, the request for a portion of the tax revenue is meant to acknowledge Roanoke’s contribution to the authority, and the fact that the water in the reservoir is an important aspect of the park’s tourism draw.
Cobb’s letter states that “significant fluctuations in water levels” could hurt the local economy and recreational opportunities at the park.
The water for the Google data center, at least in the first stage of the project, would be pulled exclusively from Carvins Cove, McEvoy said. The initial phase of the data center project will not have any effect on the water level at Carvins Cove, he said, but water level fluctuations are something the authority deals with on a daily basis in general.
Cobb’s proposal includes a list of requests of Botetourt, including funding or delivering “equivalent water capacity” within 10 to 15 years and delivering annual progress reports to the city. Until all elements of the proposal are carried out, the letter says, the county is to contribute 15% of its revenue.
He also requested that a binding intergovernmental agreement and a joint monitoring committee be formed to enforce these requests.
Cobb on Wednesday said that he was aware that a water replacement plan was in place, but was not aware of specifics, and said “it doesn’t address the asset as a whole.” He said that these conversations could have been handled more effectively earlier on, and that he was only made aware of the Google land purchase three months ago.
“There could have been a [nondisclosure agreement], and I don’t know about that, but it seems to me a little odd that [for] a project that took 18 months, that we’re only hearing about it as a city 15 months in,” Cobb said.
Larrowe said this process was “never a secret” among localities in the region. He said water authority board members would have known about it, as would those present for meetings of the Roanoke Regional Partnership, an economic development group.
Roanoke City Manager Valmarie Turner sits on the water authority’s board of directors, along with two other representatives from the city. The city holds three of eight total seats. Turner declined a request for an interview for this story.
“I don’t have all the information and I don’t think Turner does,” Cobb said Wednesday.
Increasing water needs in the valley as economic development grows
McEvoy said the water authority had anticipated needing an additional water source in the Roanoke Valley in about 35 years, even before the Google project was announced.
“I never would have thought during my career we would have been taking this on,” McEvoy said of a water supply project of this scope.
But with the Google data center news, he said, the authority decided it was a good idea to start planning for it early.
There are a number of options for obtaining water for the data center, McEvoy said. Treated wastewater could be used instead of potable water, or air could be used instead of water for cooling in later stages of the data center project. There’s also potential for an entirely new reservoir, which would be costly for Botetourt.
“The county, to their credit, also recognized that for them to attract economic development … that maybe a water source in addition to Carvins Cove would be useful for them instead of having to rely on Carvins Cove as their primary source,” McEvoy said.
Cobb said Botetourt County has not responded to his letter. In a recent meeting with Roanoke, Roanoke County and Botetourt leaders, reactions to his letter and concerns were “mixed,” he said.
A couple of weeks after Cobb sent his letter, Roanoke County Administrator Richard Caywood, who sits on the authority’s board of directors, sent a letter to Larrowe stating that if Roanoke is to receive a share of the Google revenue, Roanoke County would expect the same as an “equal partner” in the formation of the authority.
“Roanoke County has long supported the orderly growth and development of both the County and the surrounding region,” Caywood wrote in the letter, which was obtained by Cardinal News. He said the Spring Hollow Reservoir, developed and constructed by the county in the mid-1990s, is a “key element of commitment to regional water supply.”
In an interview Tuesday, Caywood said his main concern is ensuring water availability for future projects. He said there are a number of different avenues that can be looked at to increase the overall water storage to solve this issue.
“My worry is not that we use it all up, but that we stay ahead of the curve,” Caywood said.
He said he hopes that the water authority’s board of directors can make a unanimous vote — “If I thought it was going to be something different than that, I would probably want to consult with our board.”
John Hull, executive director of the Roanoke Regional Partnership, said this kind of larger project involves widespread cooperation.
“We punch above our weight when we work together. And localities that are cooperating, that are competing together for the win, the reality is economic impact is broad and regional,” Hull said.
Companies like Google look at the overall market, Hull said, without “a whole lot of regard for municipal boundaries.”
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Correction 9:15 a.m. July 17: The town of Fincastle contracts with the Western Virginia Water Authority for services. Its relationship to the authority was incorrect in an earlier version of this story.
