NW Georgia business booms continue into 2024
JDruckenmiller@CalhounTimes.com
As we begin 2024, we do so with the optimism akin to a perfect opening day at a baseball spring training site when it comes to industry and business around the area.
What’s on our radar so far around Northwest Georgia:
CFL Flooring expansion: Creative Flooring Solutions co-founder and president Thomas Baert announced in November a major expansion investment into the company’s already booming Calhoun facility. A $151 million expansion is planned for the Highway 41 plant that has already grown significantly since moving from its Lovers Lane location. The vinyl flooring manufacturer plans to add up to 300 jobs under 700,000 square feet, with another 280 jobs possible over a five-year period.
CFL Flooring, 3576 U.S. 41 near Calhoun.
Synthica Energy: Following a be diverted from local landfills. lengthy due diligence process, the The expected $68 million investment Ohio-based company in November could create around 19 highpaying finally closed on land owned jobs. by the Gordon-Floyd Joint Development The EV battery plant: Everyday, Authority for its newest as you drive by the SK On/ anaerobic digestion facility where Hyundai electric battery campus, up to 300,000 tons of industrial you see new steel, new roads, new organic waste is expected to annually everything. The $5 billion plant should be operational in 2025 but what we’re also watching is which second-tier companies will be announced nearby over the next 12 months. The Rome-Floyd County Development Authority has placed a big bet off U.S. 411 in landing some of those support companies.
Qcells revs up later this year: Qcells solar factory is well underway in the Highland 75 industrial park off I-75 in Bartow County just below the Gordon County line. The $2.5 billion campus will employ 2,000 people producing solar ingots, wafers, cells and finished panels. At least report, “Things are moving smoothly and we are still aiming to produce there in (the fourth quarter of) 2024,” says Qcells’ Marta Stoepker of the Bartow campus. The Dalton locations are doing just that.
BUSINESS,
Hanwha Qcells already has a $171 million solar module facility near the Carbondale Road exit in Whitfield Count just above the Gordon line.
Microsoft moves: This one isn’t due for a few years but we’ll be watching what happens in 2024 in terms of preplanning, site prep on the 347 acres in West Rome and other moves. The company’s billion-dollar data center will employ up to 150 people.
Former Summit Hill Foods site in downtown Rome: Even as Summit Hill Foods has stopped production on First Avenue, campus owner Grain Craft continues milling there. We’re hopeful to hear some updates on what Grain Craft has planned for the site with Summit Hill’s operations now centralized here in Lindale. We’ve heard a few rumbles.