ATLANTA — Norfolk Southern will serve a new $6 billion Eli Lilly and Co. manufacturing campus that the pharmaceutical company will build in Huntsville, Ala.
The project, which was announced on Tuesday, is the largest single initial investment in Alabama history, Gov. Kay Ivey said.
NS will provide carload service to the plant, which is expected to open in 2032.
“We’re honored to support Eli Lilly’s vision for next-generation medicine manufacturing in Huntsville,” said Craig Hudson, the railroad’s group vice president of industrial development. “We invested in a dedicated rail spur to help deliver critical raw materials and finished products, strengthening supply chain resilience and expanding access to life-changing medicines. This project marks a milestone for rail in the biotechnology space, and we’re proud to be part of it.”
Neither the railroad nor Eli Lilly would say what specific commodities NS will handle to and from the new manufacturing facility.
The Huntsville site will be a synthetic medicine active pharmaceutical ingredient facility, the third of four new U.S. sites Lilly plans to announce, and will produce small molecule synthetic and peptide medicines.
The multi-building campus will span over 1 million square feet, supporting manufacturing, logistics, packaging, lab, and utilities operations. The project will create 450 permanent jobs and generate 3,000 construction jobs.
The facility will make orforglipron, Lilly’s first oral, small molecule GLP-1 receptor agonist, and other next-generation medicines.
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