The hottest question in Nashua is why Chinese beverage giant Nongfu Spring spent $67 million to buy an industrial building in the Gate City valued at a quarter of that amount. It’s going to be front and center at the Nashua Board of Aldermen meeting Tuesday night.
For months, speculation has swirled around the motivations behind Zhong Shanshan’s decision to purchase the property and buy up millions of gallons of water from the city’s supply. Zhong, the richest man in China with a net worth of around $60 billion, operates his business under the scrutiny of the Chinese Communist Party.
Concerns surround the building’s proximity to area military installations — the New Boston Space Force Station is just 20 minutes away — as well as defense contractors and vital infrastructure. It’s also in the flight path of the Nashua Airport.
All of that has added to the angst of Granite Staters concerned about growing Chinese influence in the U.S. It’s also sparked a flurry of national media attention. One of the people who’s been waving the red flag is former Chinese citizen Lily Tang Williams, who is running to represent Nashua in the U.S. Congress and plans to attend Tuesday’s Board of Aldermen meeting.
“I lived under the regime for 24 years,” Williams told radio host Jack Heath Monday. “I’m very aware of the ambitions of China’s leader, Xi Jinping. He has a dream for China, which is to overtake the United States by 2049 and become the dominant power. This is his long-term goal and China is our biggest adversary country.”
That is why Williams asks, “Why do we even sell our natural resources like water to our biggest adversary?”
Nongfu purchased the 330,000-square-foot property at 80 Northwest Boulevard in February. The property had last been used by an educational supply company. At the time of the sale, the name of the buyer was not disclosed.
Nongfu sells bottled water, tea, juices, and other drinks. It was one of the first private beverage companies to emerge in China in the 1990s and helped make Zhong China’s richest man.
When Williams, who is challenging incumbent U.S. Rep. Maggie Goodlander (D), first began talking about the Nongfu Spring purchase, she was largely ignored. But in a sign of the political potency of the issue, last week Goodlander sent a letter to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent in his capacity as Chairperson of the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (“CFIUS”) calling for a retroactive review of the $67 million purchase.
“Anytime we see a major acquisition of important real estate by a foreign adversary or competitor near sensitive American facilities, whether it be farm land, water infrastructure, or land near our military installations, we must investigate that thoroughly to understand if there is a threat posed to our communities, our economy, or our military,” Goodlander said in a statement.
What has some local residents worried is the fact that the Northwest Boulevard property is adjacent to Pennichuck Pond, one of many ponds in the Pennichuck water system that serves as the main source of water for Nashua.
Nashua’s water supply is managed by the Pennichuck Corporation, a semi-private water company controlled by the city. Nashua purchased Pennichuck in 2012 in a unique $200 million deal that left the corporate structure in place but positioned the city as the sole shareholder.
While some have expressed concerns that Nongfu planned to buy out Pennichuck and take over the water company, that won’t happen. Pennichuck Board Chair C. George Bower told NHJournal that Nongfu isn’t getting anything but water from Pennichuck, and it will be treated like any other commercial water customer.
“There is zero plan to sell the company, there is zero plan to sell any land. We have no land to sell,” Bower said.
Zhong’s relationship with the CCP, his company’s less-than-stellar environmental history, and the apparent secrecy surrounding the Nashua plant prompted Gov. Kelly Ayotte to say she would be watching the deal to make sure Nongfu remains a Pennichuck customer and not an owner.
“It’s critical that we safeguard New Hampshire from foreign adversaries like China. We need to ensure we aren’t allowing any national security threat to take root in our state,” Ayotte said in June.
The purchase was also part of the motivation behind legislation passed this summer to ban people from hostile foreign nations like China, Iran, and Russia from buying property in New Hampshire.
“I’m very concerned, especially when you look at what’s happening to our agricultural land and agricultural land near military bases,” said Sen. Regina Birdsell (R-Hampstead), the lead sponsor of the new law.
Pennichuck has the capacity to produce up to 35 million gallons per day, Bower said, and has plenty of capacity for Nongfu’s planned operations. Any costs associated with hooking Nongfu up to Pennichuck’s water system, like adding new water lines, will be borne by Nongfu. Pennichuck already supplies water for the Anheuser-Busch brewery in Merrimack, which Belgian beverage conglomerate InBev owns.
Republican state Sen. Kevin Avard, who represents Nashua, recently wrote in NHJournal that he’s not going to let the issue fade away.
“The fight is far from over. Nashua’s water and land belong to the people of New Hampshire — not to a foreign regime with a track record of espionage and exploitation. We must stay vigilant. No more backroom deals. No more foreign land grabs. No more gambling with our water supply and national security.”
