Millions of dollars from state coffers will help prepare a Utah National Guard site for two potential manufacturing facilities – including one that could produce the hardware used in uranium enrichment.

The Military Installation Development Authority, or MIDA, last month approved a $16.5 million loan from its own infrastructure loan bank to support the manufacturing projects.

The loan from the authority to itself, with a 2.25% interest rate over 15 years, will fund the extension of utilities, clearing and excavating the site and other work to make a buildable site on part of 400 acres at Camp Williams.

State officials announced last summer that there was an agreement between MIDA, the Utah National Guard and Utah Energy to build the facility that would manufacture equipment needed to enrich uranium at the Guard site.

The facility would be to the west of Camp Williams and the National Security Agency’s Utah Data Center, which straddle the line between Salt Lake and Utah counties at the southern tip of Bluffdale.

MIDA leases the 400 acres there from the Utah Armory Board, and then subleases it to Utah Energy, a subsidiary of California-based nuclear startup General Matter.

The current plan is to manufacture the hardware used to enrich uranium at facilities like the one in Eunice, New Mexico.

That will be a “great benefit” to Utah and employment, MIDA’s Executive Director Paul Morris told the board during a meeting last month when the board approved the loan. It will also provide some residual income to the Utah National Guard, he said.

State leaders have said they hope Camp Williams will eventually be home to an enrichment facility, though local leaders aren’t sold on the idea.

Salt Lake County Mayor Jenny Wilson said last year she worries an enrichment site in the valley could become a target for an foriegn advisary.

An enrichment facility at Camp Williams, if built, would be just the second in the country.

Creating nuclear fuel for reactors starts with the mining and milling of uranium, both of which already take place in Utah, and state officials are pushing to fast-track nuclear energy production.

For now, though, all that’s happened is “exploration and site prep for a potential advanced manufacturing project,” said Kristin Kenney Williams, spokesperson for MIDA.

The loan includes funding for prep work on a second site as well, assuming MIDA can work out another lease with the Utah National Guard and a sublease with a company it’s currently in negotiations with.

It isn’t clear what that company is, but Morris said they would build a “great manufacturing facility that caters specifically to military uses.”