Lake Ralph Hall Pipeline Nearing Completion
Mar 2025
Fannin County, TX (February 12, 2025) – The final section of pipeline to transport water from Lake Ralph Hall is nearing completion, a major milestone for Texas’ newest lake.
Lake Ralph Hall will provide up to 54 million gallons of water per day to the communities Upper Trinity Regional Water District serves in Denton and Collin Counties, as well as the City of Ladonia and a portion of Fannin County. The nearly finished 32-mile pipeline will connect Lake Ralph Hall to an existing pipeline to transport water for treatment and delivery.
On February 4, Upper Trinity board members and staff, engineers, contractors and local city and county officials celebrated the extensive collaboration to complete this critical phase of the Lake Ralph Hall project. The ceremony featured remarks by Ed Motley, Upper Trinity’s Lake Ralph Hall Program Manager, Andrew Beck, Area Manager at Garney, Ian Willoughby, sales manager at American Spiralweld, and Larry N. Patterson, Executive Director of Upper Trinity. All participants at the event were invited to sign a commemorative piece of pipe for future display.
“This marks a key step in ensuring a reliable water supply for our customer communities in North Texas,” said Upper Trinity’s Executive Director Larry Patterson.
Lockwood, Andrews & Newnam, Inc. (LAN), led the pipeline’s design and mapping the 32-mile route for best performance. LAN’s design team and Upper Trinity coordinated directly with local landowners to minimize impacts wherever possible. The pipe’s 66-inch and 72-inch spiral-welded steel pipes were locally manufactured in Paris, TX, by AMERICAN SpiralWeld Pipe.
Garney Construction was the Construction Manager at Risk, working with five engineering, construction, and consulting firms. The team managed 16 bid packages, overseeing material procurement and coordinating with 11 contractors to lay 3,400 sections of pipe. Garney self-performed two pipeline sections and partnered with local subcontractors for fencing and clearing the right-of-way. In total, this effort contributed to the creation of numerous local jobs.
Throughout the project, Garney worked closely with Hunt County and Fannin County commissioners, fostering strong local partnerships and engaging the community. “This project reflects teamwork and coordination at every stage,” said Andrew Beck. “We were coordinating daily with the other engineering, construction and consulting companies on both pumped and gravity-flow segments of pipeline, tunnels under roads or other pipes and lines, a new balancing reservoir and control station as well as a new pump station being managed and built by Archer Western.”
Black & Veatch Corporation, Jacobs Engineering Group, and Freese & Nichols provided engineering expertise on the pipeline. Freese & Nichols also engineered the pump station and AR Consultants, Inc. assisted with cultural resources. This project is scheduled to be completed by December 2025.
About Lake Ralph Hall
Scheduled for completion in 2026, Lake Ralph Hall will provide a sustainable water supply for Upper Trinity and Fannin County, as well as recreational and economic benefits for the City of Ladonia and Fannin County. For more details about Lake Ralph Hall and the pipeline part of the project, visit LakeRalphHall.com.
About Upper Trinity Regional Water District
Upper Trinity is a regional water district created by the Texas Legislature in 1989 for the benefit of cities and utilities in the Denton County area. Its mandate is to develop regional plans for water services, and to provide both water and wastewater services on a wholesale basis to cities and utilities within its service area, including all of Denton County and portions of Dallas and Collin Counties. For more information, please contact Jason Pierce, Manager of Government Affairs & Communications at 972-219-1228.
About Garney
Garney is the national leader in water and wastewater infrastructure. Since 1961, Garney has been committed to delivering clean, safe drinking water and protecting public health through essential water and wastewater systems. Garney specializes in self-performing construction services for water and wastewater pipelines, treatment facilities, pumping stations, water storage tanks, and industrial/heavy civil projects through conventional and collaborative delivery methods for municipal, federal, and private sector clients. As a 100% employee-owned company with 18 regional offices and 2,500 employee-owners, Garney is committed to advancing the future of water and wastewater infrastructure. At the core of Garney’s work is its guiding purpose: Building Sustainable Futures with the World’s Most Previous Resources – Water & People®.
PERENfra Announces Launch of Perennial Infrastructure Fund I™ with Garney and Ferguson as Strategic Investors
Feb 2025
Denver, CO – February 13, 2025 – PERENfra LLC (“PERENfra”) today announced the launch of Perennial Infrastructure Fund I™ (the “Fund”), a private investment fund focused on core water infrastructure assets. The Fund aims to provide investors with income and long-term capital appreciation through investments in safe, sustainable, efficient water solutions in a growing industry.
With a target size of $125 million, the Fund has successfully closed multiple limited partner (LP) commitments and is seeking to be fully subscribed by early 2025. The Fund is led by Jeff C. Nelson, the Founder and CEO of PERENfra, along with Gary Brauchle, its President.
PERENfra is Manager of the Fund’s General Partner and PIF Equity Partners, LLC is the Fund’s investment manager. PERENfra has operated independently since being formed in 2020, and after building a substantial opportunity pipeline and portfolio of sustainable water infrastructure investments, PERENfra decided to launch the Fund to support its continued expansion and growth.
The Fund has brought in two strategic investors: Garney Equity Holdings and Ferguson Ventures. The two have teamed up with PERENfra to position the Fund as the first of its kind investment vehicle focused solely on water infrastructure.
Jeff Nelson, Founder and CEO of PERENfra, said:
“We’re humbled and excited by the support of our investors and partners in the Fund. There is an unfulfilled need for capital in the water infrastructure market, and we’re ready to address that demand. We’re confident in our investment strategy, and we look forward to continuing our positive environmental and social impacts while delivering attractive long-term returns to our investors.”
Garney Equity Holdings is the investment arm of Garney Companies Inc., the largest water and wastewater contractor in the U.S., and is uniquely positioned to provide valuable insight into the current state of U.S. water infrastructure. With decades of experience addressing complex water and wastewater challenges in all sectors including municipal, federal, industrial and private owners, Garney recognizes and appreciates the critical need to modernize and strengthen the nation’s water infrastructure. “Garney is proud to support the Fund’s goals, which align closely with our purpose: Building Sustainable Futures with the World’s Most Precious Resources – Water and People®,” said David Burkhart, CEO at Garney. “By investing in the Fund, we’re advancing a shared vision of resilient, sustainable water solutions that will serve communities for generations to come.”
Ferguson is the largest value-added distributor serving the residential and non-residential specialized professional. Ferguson Ventures is the corporate venture capital and strategic partnering arm of Ferguson, focusing on innovation within the $340B North American construction market.
“Ferguson Ventures sees this investment in the Perennial Infrastructure Fund I as a strategic step toward enhancing innovation and sustainability within the water infrastructure sector,” said Blake Luse, Managing Director at Ferguson Ventures. “By engaging with PERENfra and Garney, we aim to deepen our understanding of emerging technologies and industry trends that can enrich our ability to serve our customers. This collaboration is in line with our core mission to provide value-added solutions and supports our commitment to fostering sustainable water solutions for the communities we serve.”
The Fund has made significant progress in allocating its capital and anticipates full deployment by 2026. The initial investments are supported by long-term contracts to finance, design, construct, own, and operate six (6) new water and wastewater treatment plants.
The Fund has attracted substantial interest from investors knowledgeable about the water industry and the challenges associated with the traditional investment options in the sector. The Fund focuses on unique opportunities that are sole-sourced which improves efficiency and greatly improves the timeline to develop and construct much needed infrastructure.
In addition to Garney and Ferguson, the Fund’s initial LP’s are comprised of various US-based family offices.
Davis Graham and Stubbs LLP served as legal counsel to the Fund.
About PERENfra:
PERENfra invests in, acquires, develops, and operates essential water infrastructure. Our assets provide our clients and partners reliability, efficiency, and quality in a market that is suffering from severe underinvestment and aging infrastructure. Led by a team of experts with more than 120 years of combined experience in the water sector, PERENfra is focused on ensuring water quality, conservation, and accessibility across the United States.
About Garney:
Garney Companies Inc. is the national leader in water and wastewater infrastructure. Since 1961, Garney has been committed to delivering clean, safe drinking water and protecting public health through essential water and wastewater systems. Garney specializes in self-performing construction services for water and wastewater pipelines, treatment facilities, pumping stations, water storage tanks, and industrial/heavy civil projects through conventional and collaborative delivery methods for municipal, federal, and private sector clients. As a 100% employee-owned company with 18 regional offices and 2,500 employee-owners, Garney is committed to advancing the future of water and wastewater infrastructure. At the core of Garney’s work is its guiding purpose: Building Sustainable Futures with the World’s Most Precious Resources – Water & People®.
About Ferguson:
Ferguson (NYSE: FERG; LSE: FERG) is the largest value-added distributor serving the specialized professional in our $340B residential and non-residential North American construction market. We help make our customers’ complex projects simple, successful and sustainable by providing expertise and a wide range of products and services from plumbing, HVAC, appliances and lighting to PVF, water and wastewater solutions and more. Headquartered in Newport News, Va., Ferguson has sales of $29.6 billion (FY’24) and approximately 35,000 associates in nearly 1,800 locations.