Infrastructure Story Archives - West Virginia Public Broadcasting

$1.2 Billion Grant To Expand Broadband Coverage To All W.Va. Homes

The U.S. Department of Commerce has granted West Virginia $1.2 billion for affordable broadband services. More than 300,000 West Virginia households were underserved by broadband in 2023.

Spotty internet access has long proven an issue for the mountainsides of West Virginia.

In 2023, more than 300,000 households across the state were unserved or underserved by broadband coverage. This month, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) found that coverage in the Mountain State ranks second-worst nationally, besting only Alaska.

But a new federal grant aims to address current gaps in coverage, ensuring that every household can receive broadband internet services.

On Thursday, the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) granted West Virginia more than $1.21 billion for high-speed internet services based on a plan first announced in 2023.

The funding comes from the $42.45 billion Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) program — part of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act that President Joe Biden signed into effect in 2021.

These funds will go toward the creation of new broadband internet infrastructure in regions with low internet download and upload speeds.

West Virginia residents can anticipate improvements to their internet services between one-and-a-half and five years after funds are distributed, according to Evan Feinman, BEAD program director.

Specific timelines vary from region to region based on “proximity to existing infrastructure,” he said during a virtual press briefing Thursday.

State grants were determined based on current broadband coverage needs, and were finalized through a collaboration between state and federal officials, Feinman said.

This meant coordinating with the West Virginia Department of Economic Development’s Office of Broadband.

After an initial figure for the state’s grant was set by NTIA in 2023, state officials had to develop specific plans for how grant dollars would be spent, according to Kelly Collins Workman, the office’s director.

This included crafting a five-year plan for how improvements would be implemented, plus strategies for promoting digital equity across the state, she said.

When the “historic opportunity” to participate in the BEAD program came along, Collins Workman said her office “poured our heart and soul” into the application process “to secure $1.2 billion for our state.”

“We jumped in with both feet,” she said. “We worked as hard as we could, as fast as we could.”

Mitch Carmichael, cabinet secretary for the department, said the collaboration was crucial to expanding economic resources for West Virginians.

“When we connect people in every corner of our state — and every hill and every valley and every region — the world becomes a better place,” he said.

Carmichael emphasized that changes provided by the program would be sweeping. “This program will reach every address. Every single address,” he said.

The BEAD grant comes during a particularly tenuous moment for affordable internet services nationally, as funding for a federal internet subsidy program used widely in West Virginia is set to lapse this month.

Since 2021, the FCC has provided broadband internet subsidies to low-income households nationwide through the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP).

More than 127,000 West Virginia households rely on the program for support. But a renewal of the program’s funding has failed to receive bipartisan support in Congress, despite pushes from Democratic lawmakers.

Feinman said ACP’s goals differ from those of the BEAD program. Where ACP provides households financial support to afford internet services, BEAD creates infrastructure so that it is possible to access the internet in the first place.

Still, Feinman said the two programs have overlapping missions, and that NTIA officials were “disappointed” by the program’s imminent expiration.

“A kid who grows up in a house with a reliable internet connection has a higher GPA, [and is] more likely to go to postsecondary education,” he said. “Elderly folks can age in place safely. There’s such tremendous benefits to having folks get online.”

Feinman said that the existence of subsidy programs like ACP gave way to the development of new broadband infrastructure programs like BEAD.

With more residents able to afford internet services, companies were encouraged to spread their infrastructure projects nationally, he said. This includes the rural and low-income communities targeted by programs like BEAD.

“The program going away is going to make it more expensive to build these networks,” Feinman said. “That said, we are still going to be able to get them to every single West Virginia home and business.”

While ACP’s renewal struggled to receive bipartisan support on the Senate floor, state officials’ praise for the BEAD program stretched across the aisle.

Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., said that the BEAD program has provided important resources to residents across West Virginia. In a Thursday statement, he renewed his commitment to ensuring the state can “deliver broadband service to every West Virginia family and business.”

Likewise, Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., said in a Thursday statement that the new grant would “better connect homes, businesses and classrooms across the state.”

“While there is still a long road ahead to getting more West Virginians connected, we are well on our way,” she said.

W.Va. Analysts Develop New Tech To Visualize Flood Risks

West Virginia geospatial officials are developing new technology to help visualize flood and landslide risk in the state. The project aims to create more accessible and updated community-level flood risk data.

April storms have caused flooding across West Virginia, from the Northern Panhandle to the state capital.

Flooding events like these are familiar territory for many residents. According to the West Virginia GIS Technical Center, 286 communities across the state are located directly on flood plains — areas adjacent to waterways that can become inundated by rising water levels.

The center has long worked to identify flood risks through digital mapping software. On Sunday, state analysts presented new developments in this effort to the West Virginia Legislature’s Joint Legislative Committee on Flooding.

Currently, the center is working to strengthen local flood risk data and to create data visualization tools more easily understood by members of the public, according to Co-Director Aaron Maxwell.

Often, emergency management data comes from the federal level, which limits the level of detail available on the local level.

The center is working to update structural and flood plain data across the state to “support the public and flood plain managers in flood-prone communities,” and to develop a “higher grain of detail than what’s available with federal tools,” Maxwell said.

Last year, the center began developing the West Virginia Flood Resiliency Framework through a grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF). This has allowed the center to develop mapping and modeling tools on flood risk and resiliency across the state, Maxwell said.

Beyond modeling how waterways and properties would be affected by rising water levels, Maxwell said the center is also conducting a statewide survey to assess how residents feel about flood risks and recovery efforts in their community.

The center will then flesh out additional reports on flood risk preparedness locally, Maxwell said.

By providing resources like new data visualization software and survey reports to the public, Maxwell said the center hopes to bolster “data-driven decision-making in the state,” like corroborating emergency relief grant requests with concrete data.

Maxwell also said that the center has been working with West Virginia’s State Resiliency Office to compile these resources into a “one-stop shop for people to go to, to investigate their flood risk.”

This furthers the center’s goals of providing more accessible data for the public. Pulling it all together in one location is easier for every-day residents, like how 3D visualization tools are more easily understood than convoluted or industry-specific information, Maxwell said.

Aaron Maxwell, co-director of the West Virginia GIS Technical Center, speaks to members of the West Virginia Legislature Sunday.

*Photo Credit: Perry Bennett/WV Legislative Photography*

The center is also working to develop tools that can assess risks associated with flooding, like landslides.

Kurt Donaldson, geographic information system (GIS) manager at the center, said that landslides are the second most costly form of natural disaster to West Virginia, second only to flooding.

“Just where West Virginia is, with the steep slopes, landslides are always an issue,” he said during the committee meeting Sunday. “Sometimes they get categorized as flood-damaged structures when it was associated with a mudslide.”

Donaldson said that the center is developing a state landslide susceptibility grid.

Like the flood risk visualization maps, these aim to convey to local officials and members of the public emergency risks present in their communities. “It can be useful for identifying areas that are susceptible to landslides,” he said.

While the center will continue to work on the project in the coming months, Maxwell said their NSF funding ends in October, requiring sustainable, long-term funding resources to keep data up to date.

Sen. Chandler Swope, R-Mercer, said that flood risk management is often overlooked in financial discussions within the Legislature, which he views as an oversight.

“Flooding has been, in budget terms at least, virtually ignored for 100 years,” he said during Sunday’s meeting. “We’ve got the other highways, water, sewer, broadband, et cetera infrastructure, but flooding is not on our agenda as a major infrastructure need for West Virginia.”

Swope said that he and members of the Legislature should prioritize flood risk mitigation funding in upcoming financial discussions.

“As money becomes available after other infrastructure needs are met, I think we should give serious consideration to doing what we can for flood mitigation, and we’ll choose the highest priority places first,” he said.

Swope also said that preventing damages associated with natural disasters like floods would ultimately limit state spending on emergency response efforts.

“It’s not an expense that wouldn’t pay for itself with the proper application,” he said. “If this information had been available 100 years ago, there might be a lot of towns and cities that have a lot less damages due to floods.”

To participate in the West Virginia GIS Technical Center’s flood resiliency survey, visit the center’s West Virginia Flood Resilience Framework website.

For more information on local flood risk in West Virginia, visit the West Virginia GIS Technical Center’s West Virginia Flood Tool.

This 3D model from the West Virginia GIS Technical Center shows how rising water levels would affect a West Virginia home.

*Image Credit: West Virginia Flood Tool/West Virginia GIS Technical Center*

How Baltimore Port Closure Affects Coal Producers In W.Va.

For now, the companies that produce the coal will have to find a way to other ports, mainly Norfolk or the Gulf Coast.

The closure of the Port of Baltimore to most shipping has a ripple effect for coal producers in northern West Virginia.

Baltimore exported 28 million tons of coal last year, about half of it from the Mountain State.

After a container ship struck the Francis Scott Key highway bridge last week, collapsing the structure, Baltimore Harbor’s coal piers have been cut off from the rest of the world.

For now, the companies that produce the coal will have to find a way to other ports, mainly Norfolk or the Gulf Coast. If not, customers in India, China, Japan and South Korea, among others, may have to turn to alternative sources.

John Saldanha, a professor of global supply chain management at West Virginia University (WVU), said Baltimore is the second largest U.S. export port for coal behind Norfolk, accounting for about a fifth of U.S. coal exports.

He said even if Norfolk and other ports have the capacity to absorb coal shipments that would otherwise come through Baltimore, it will raise shipping costs. That includes more train crews, more railcars and locomotives and more space to store the coal on the ground at another port.

“In the short run immediately, clearly, there’s going to be an increase in transportation costs. And depending upon what capacity the rail carriers can find, and how much diversion capacity, the rail carriers find both on the transportation networks as well as at the ocean piers, that is going to tell whether the coal producers will actually have to throttle back on their production in the short run,” he said. “Because if they continue producing at current rates, and there is no way to load that coal onto railcars, and for those railcars to go to the port, and there is no capacity at the port, then clearly that will require the coal producers to throttle back on production.”

Saldanha said in ordinary times, northern Appalachian coal from West Virginia and Pennsylvania is closer to the Port of Baltimore. Now that, that’s been disrupted, even temporarily, producers may take a look at whether they need to consider an alternative,

“Given that Baltimore and its proximity to the northern Appalachian coal basin might have been attractive from a transportation cost standpoint. But putting all your eggs in one basket, shipping everything else with the port Baltimore, of course, such Black Swan events nobody can anticipate, but then you always want to hedge,” he said. “And if you have all of your eggs in one basket, and you’re exporting everything to one single export port, then if anything happens either to the transportation links to that port within the port or coming out of that port that is going to that’s going to disable your operation, or at least hobble your operation in the short run.”

The Longer Way Around

Also ordinarily, Mid-Atlantic ports are closer to markets in Asia through the Suez Canal. But recent turmoil in the Middle East has caused the diversion of oceangoing vessels around the Cape of Good Hope at the southern tip of Africa. Saldhana said that gives Gulf Coast ports an advantage.

“So normally, coming from the Port of Baltimore, it would have been a lot easier to go into the Suez Canal,” he said. “But now because of the Red Sea, and the Houthi rebels affecting shipping over there, all the ships, so going down from the Gulf of Mexico to the cape, that might actually even be a little bit more competitive compared to coming out of the East Coast, given that all the ships of several shipping companies are opting to route their ships down around the cape.”

Even if Asian customers may need to consider sourcing coal from elsewhere – Australia, for example – Saldhana said they still prefer northern Appalachian coal because of its quality.

“So I think in the long run, the northern Appalachian Basin coal provides a superior product to the other coal sources,” he said, “but in the short run, there are definitely substitutes that are available that, while not of the same quality, would definitely fill the need.”

Federal, state and local officials have said their first priority is to reopen the Port of Baltimore. But they will have to remove all the pieces of the fallen bridge from the water, and that’s not a small task. Saldanha said the port may not reopen for weeks, if not months.

Point Pleasant’s Silver Bridge Disaster In 1967 Improved Bridge Safety

The Silver Bridge collapse, on the Ohio River at Point Pleasant, killed 46 people. After it, the Federal Highway Administration began using National Bridge Inspection Standards.

The collapse of a highway bridge in Baltimore Harbor may remind some West Virginians of a tragedy that changed how bridges nationwide are inspected.

Before the Silver Bridge failed on the evening of Dec. 15, 1967, there was no national standard for bridge inspection.

The Silver Bridge collapse, on the Ohio River at Point Pleasant, killed 46 people. In 1971, the Federal Highway Administration began using National Bridge Inspection Standards.

They required the inspection of bridges and their components at least once every two years, with emphasis on fractures, corrosion and fatigue – all of which played a part in the Silver Bridge’s failure.

Stan Bumgardner, a state historian and editor of the West Virginia Encyclopedia, says technology today could have spotted the hidden flaw in the Silver Bridge. It couldn’t then.

“Now, today, they have, you know, techniques where you can get cameras, and you can see places where you couldn’t have seen in 1967. But in 1967 nobody really ever faulted the bridge inspectors for missing anything, just because it wasn’t part of the routine to check for that. And it would have been virtually impossible, they would have had to have been looking for. a needle in a haystack and knowing where the needle was, and still trying to find it.”

Bumgardner says he’s spoken to people in the community who not only remember that day, but remember the people who were killed. Some were classmates or members of the same church. Some were neighbors. One man lost both his parents.

He says the memory is so strong, decades later, that incidents like the one in Baltimore remind people of it.

“I’m sure for people in Point Pleasant who remember, December the 15th 1967, that anytime there’s any of these bridge incidents, collapses, problems with where they have to shut down bridges, even where they’re even no deaths involved. I’m sure it takes all those people in Point Pleasant back to 1967. And they remember exactly where they were and how they felt right then.”

As with the Silver Bridge then, the National Transportation Safety Board is investigating the Baltimore collapse now. It could take the agency as long as two years to produce a report.

And from there, changes will be made to improve bridge safety from the lessons learned.

Rural Infrastructure, Business Projects Receive $5.8 Million In Federal Funds

Eight projects seeking to bolster infrastructure and business in rural West Virginia will receive new federal funding through a $5.8 million budget allocated by the United States Department of Agriculture.

The projects take part in the USDA Rural Development program, which offers grants and loans to projects bolstering economic development and public services.

In a press release Tuesday, Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., said the new funding would play an important role in strengthening the West Virginia economy.

“Investing in our communities is essential for economic development and for creating good-paying jobs,” he said.

The following projects received new loan and/or grant funding through the USDA:

Town of Triadelphia: $1,600,000 to upgrade a sewer collection system.
Town of Wardensville: $1,100,00 to improve wastewater services.
Wayne County Building Commission: $1,087,000 to renovate a courtroom in the Wayne County Courthouse.
Claywood Park Public Service: $940,000 to upgrade water lines in rural Wood County.
Mason County Public Service District: $814,000 to improve sewer services.
Brunetti’s Italian Bakery: $150,753 to buy and install a 167-kilowatt array.
Rural Action: $78,000 to encourage recycling and composting efficiency.
Woodlands Community Lenders: $51,005 for microloans and assistance to entrepreneurs in rural Randolph, Barbour and Tucker counties.

New $3 Million Water Treatment Plant Slated For Berkeley County

Residents of Bunker Hill, an unincorporated community of Berkeley County, are slated to receive a new $3 million water pump through the United States Environmental Protection Agency.

Berkeley County will soon receive a new water treatment plant, following a $3 million investment from the United States Environmental Protection Agency.

The new plant will service the unincorporated community of Bunker Hill. The current treatment plant there is 65 years old.

The Berkeley County Public Service Water District, which oversees the plant, has gained 4,000 new users in the last four years.

With West Virginia’s water infrastructure facing long-running issues tied to age and decreased funding, state officials have invested in water system upgrades for local communities in recent years.

This year alone, tens of millions of dollars have gone toward water projects across the state. The latest round of funding follows a federal spending request from Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va.

In a press release Tuesday, Capito said she hoped the project would support population growth in the Eastern Panhandle county.

“As communities in Berkeley County continue to grow and develop, the need for additional clean water infrastructure is critical,” she said. “This funding is a step in the process of directing the resources that these communities need to provide clean water to the growing number of residents and businesses in the area.”