A 50-kilowatt generator will be installed at the Washington-Tyrrell Emergency Medical Services base station on Hwy 64 East in Columbia to provide backup power, the state Department of Public Safety announced June 18.

Twenty-three other generators will be purchased through FEMA’s Hazard Mitigation Grant Program and located where they are needed to support critical public infrastructure, the department’s media release announced.

Only three communities in the northeastern counties will benefit from the $1.4 million project: Columbia, Creswell, and Plymouth.

The Creswell wastewater plant will receive a 40-kilowatt generator. The plant also treats and disposes of effluent from Tyrrell County’s sewer system in Scuppernong township.

Five generators will be placed in the Plymouth area: (1) 150-kilowatt at the town wastewater plant; (2) 45-kilowatt at the town pump station; (3) 175-kilowatt at Pines Elementary School, an emergency shelter location; (4) 22-kilowatt at old radio station transmitter site to provide backup power to the radio transmitter; and (5) 22-kilowatt at the new radio site to provide backup power to the radio station that furnished emergency information to an elderly population.

Other generators will be purchased and installed in Bladenboro, Calabash, Kinston, Maury, Snow Hill, Deep Run, Rockingham, Ellerbe, Roseboro, Salemburg, Sandyfield, Mt. Airy, and Whiteville.

The Hazard Mitigation Grant Program program provides grants for state and local governments to elevate, buy out or reconstruct homes and to strengthen public infrastructure to make communities better able to withstand future storms and disasters.

Hazard Mitigation is a cost-sharing program. FEMA provides at least 75% of costs, and the remaining 25% is covered by the state.