On the South Texas coast, the town of Corpus Christi has initiated an emergency effort to spice up its water provide as native reservoirs expertise a yearslong decline and water demand from massive industrial initiatives continues to develop.
The Corpus Christi Metropolis Council accepted a measure final week to start leasing land for wells that may pump thousands and thousands of gallons per day into the Nueces River, the area’s foremost water provide. It adopted an emergency authorization memo for the undertaking issued by the town supervisor on Dec. 31.
Two weeks earlier, Corpus Christi, which provides water to 600,000 individuals in seven counties, enacted its strictest water use restrictions in not less than 30 years, when mixed ranges in its two reservoirs on the Nueces River fell under 20% full after years of sparse rainfall.
“That is my fourth drought in my 43-year engineering profession,” mentioned John Michael, a senior vp with engineering contractor Hanson Skilled Companies and supervisor for Corpus Christi’s Nueces River groundwater undertaking, which goals to provide 20 million gallons per day by autumn. “They’re not straightforward. They’re excessive anxiousness. They’re demanding.”
Drought has all the time been part of life in South Texas. However lately, Corpus Christi has confronted mixed pressures of a chronic dry spell and record-breaking warmth throughout a interval of fast development in its industrial sector.
Metropolis leaders initially hoped to satisfy the water calls for of latest industrial services with a big seawater desalination plant, which they deliberate to construct by 2023. However the undertaking grew to become mired in delays and nonetheless stays years away from completion.
In the meantime, the brand new industrial services have begun to attract water. An unlimited plastics plant owned by ExxonMobil and Saudi Primary Industries Corp. makes use of thousands and thousands of gallons per day. A lithium refinery owned by Tesla is slowly beginning operations and plans to drastically improve its water consumption in coming years, in line with water authority information. One other firm has secured rights to thousands and thousands of gallons per day of Nueces River water to provide hydrogen for export, however hasn’t but damaged floor.
A number of different hydrogen vegetation, a carbon seize facility and a brand new refinery are additionally in improvement close by. Different corporations are excited about constructing right here, too.
“There are loads of initiatives which have checked out finding in South Texas, however will probably be troublesome till this drought is over or we’ve added some extra provide,” Michael mentioned. “It’s going to be troublesome to tackle any massive new industrial initiatives, aside from those which have already began.”
Corpus Christi now hopes to construct its first desalination plant by mid-2028. If the town’s reservoirs proceed their price of decline from current years, that could possibly be too late.
The Nueces River groundwater initiative was one in every of a number of short-term water provide initiatives described in an replace issued by the town in January. As the 2 Nueces River reservoirs dwindle, crews are additionally hurriedly increasing a pipeline and pump stations to Corpus Christi’s third reservoir, Lake Texana, which stays 75% full however is 100 miles away. The replace additionally mentioned a personal desalination plant constructed by a neighborhood plastics producer, CC Polymers, will come on-line in 2025, and could possibly be integrated into the general public water provide.
“It’s sort of an all-hands-on-deck factor proper now,” mentioned Perry Fowler, government director of the Texas Water Infrastructure Community, a lobbying group based mostly in Austin. “The water provide scenario is somewhat severe.”
Corpus Christi isn’t alone. Throughout components of south, west and central Texas, many years of fast improvement and recurring drought have stretched water provides to their limits. Official projections present some locations working dry inside 10 or 20 years, with few new sources of water to show to.
That’s a serious deterrent to massive companies, from microchip makers to chemical vegetation, that may in any other case spend money on Texas.
This yr, Fowler mentioned, water planning is anticipated to take middle stage because the Texas Legislature meets for its biennial session, with laws in improvement that might make billions of {dollars} of state financing obtainable to develop new sources throughout the state.
“Water is being seen appropriately as an financial improvement concern, so I believe it’s received actually broad help,” Fowler mentioned. “I don’t suppose I’ve ever seen the dialogue elevated to this stage.”
Actual options, he mentioned, will probably be developed over many years. Within the speedy time period, there isn’t a lot state lawmakers can do.
A bet on desalination
In Corpus Christi, leaders watched this example creep up slowly. Greater than a yr in the past, the town stopped releasing reservoir water meant to help wetland ecosystems the place the Nueces River meets the Gulf. However ranges stored falling, from 44% full in 2023 to 31% a yr in the past and 19% immediately.
In December, the town intensified restrictions for native residents, prohibiting any outside water use for landscaping or automobile washing.
Water use restrictions, nonetheless, don’t apply to the area’s sprawling refineries and chemical vegetation, because of a purchasable exemption for industrial customers handed by the Metropolis Council in 2018.
Proceeds from that exemption payment — 25 cents per 1,000 gallons consumed — have been meant to fund improvement of the seawater desalination plant that was speculated to have been prepared by 2023 to satisfy the calls for of fast development within the area’s industrial sector.
When metropolis employees members first introduced their desalination plan to the town council in 2019, they displayed a graph exhibiting massive will increase in water demand in 2022 and 2023, citing the Exxon-SABIC plastics plant, a brand new metal mill and different initiatives.
“A brand new water provide designed to satisfy new water demand ought to be in place earlier than the brand new demand is consuming water,” the presentation mentioned. “Based mostly on provide and demand projections, the primary Seawater Desalination Plant must be operational (supplying water) in early 2023.”
However the undertaking stalled, mired by infighting with the Port of Corpus Christi Authority, questions over environmental impacts to Corpus Christi Bay and challenges from activists who noticed water provide as a way to push again in opposition to industrial enlargement of their space.
In the meantime, in 2022, an exceptionally extreme drought yr, the brand new initiatives started to attract water, regularly ramping up operations. In 2023, Texas logged its hottest yr on file statewide, and 2024 grew to become the most popular on file for the South Texas area. Throughout every of these years, ranges within the Nueces River reservoirs declined.
Extra initiatives incoming
The prospect of shortage hasn’t deterred massive corporations from finding thirsty initiatives within the space, a long-established refinery hub with a busy industrial port.
“Nearly all of what are slated for our communities are large-volume water customers,” mentioned Elida Castillo, mayor pro-tem for the small metropolis of Taft, which will get its water from Corpus Christi. “On the finish of the day, they require tons of water that we shouldn’t have, and it’s all within the title of financial improvement.”
In close by Robstown, Tesla is finishing development on the nation’s first large-scale lithium refinery. The ability plans to make use of 1,000,000 gallons of water per day by October 2025 however hopes to finally use eight million gallons per day, in line with February 2024 assembly minutes from the South Texas Water Authority, a supplier that buys its water from Corpus Christi.
An inner bulletin from Corpus Christi Water in April 2024 mentioned the power may use as much as 10 million gallons per day.
Avina Clear Hydrogen, a New Jersey-based firm based in 2020, has secured rights to five.5 million gallons per day of Nueces River water to provide hydrogen ammonia for export.
“I don’t understand how they’re going to provide all of them these thousands and thousands of gallons of water per day if we don’t have any water right here,” mentioned Myra Alaniz, a retired federal authorities employee who lives close to the Avina web site and is a member of the Tejano civic group Chispa Texas.
One other hydrogen firm has leased 2,400 acres within the close by city of Agua Dulce, in line with a December 2024 report from the Robstown Space Growth Fee.
The pipeline large Enbridge can be constructing an ammonia plant in neighboring San Patricio County, which will get its water from Corpus Christi, and DRL Refineries is constructing an oil refinery to provide gasoline. To the south, in Kleberg County, a startup referred to as 1PointFive plans a big facility it says will seize 30 million tons of greenhouse gases yearly from the air, combine them with water and inject them underground to mitigate the consequences of local weather change.
By 2030, this stretch of coast will face a water shortfall of practically 28 million gallons per day if alternate provides usually are not developed, in line with Texas’ newest statewide water plan, rising to 44 million gallons per day by 2070. In that point, temperatures are anticipated to proceed rising, in line with the Workplace of the Texas State Climatologist at Texas A&M College, pushed by the buildup of greenhouse gases within the ambiance. (Texas is the biggest greenhouse gasoline emitter within the U.S. and one of many largest on the planet.)
Addressing future deficits
Based on the state’s projections, Corpus Christi ought to have the ability to deal with the demand if it succeeds in finishing a 30 million gallon per day seawater desalination plant by 2028, because it presently initiatives. However will probably be shut, and it gained’t be sufficient to satisfy future wants.
Now, the Nueces River Authority, a small public company, is main an effort to assemble events behind plans for a gargantuan desalination facility that might meet regional water wants for a era to return.
John Byrum, government director of the Nueces River Authority, wrote in a September 2024 letter to the Port of Corpus Christi Authority, obtained by way of information request: “Present water provides are a problem for industries eager to find to the Coastal Bend in addition to the Nueces Basin. If the Nueces area is to comprehend the advantages of the excessive paying jobs supplied by industries presently inquiring and wanting to maneuver to the world, water sources along with the Metropolis of Corpus Christi’s Seawater Desalination Plant have to be developed.”
Byrum proposes a desalination facility situated on an island owned by the port that may initially produce 100 million gallons per day of freshwater, then scale as much as 450 million gallons per day over subsequent many years — greater than is presently produced from any desalination plant on earth. It could embody a system of pipelines and pump stations shifting huge volumes of water a whole lot of miles uphill to satisfy the wants of cities in Central Texas.
The large enterprise would value untold billions of {dollars} and signify one of many world’s largest water infrastructure initiatives, although smaller than efforts presently underway in China.
“It’s a large undertaking, however take note we’re going to section this in,” Byrum mentioned in an interview. “We’re trying ahead to working with the Legislature this session on badly wanted water provide.”
Byrum is presently gathering resolutions of curiosity from native cities and entities, which he hopes to make use of to win help from state lawmakers after they collect in Austin for this yr’s legislative session.
For now, simply upstream from Corpus Christi, crews work unexpectedly on the emergency groundwater undertaking. A number of previous wells alongside the Nueces River banks have been used for this objective throughout droughts of the Eighties and ’90s, however have lengthy been deserted.
“Investigative work is ongoing,” mentioned a spokesperson for the Corpus Christi Water Division in a written response to questions. “That is complicated work that requires time.”
The town hopes to lease the land, check and rehabilitate the wells after which construct new pump stations to maneuver groundwater into the river and downstream to customers as quickly as potential.
Native drought situations are presently at stage three, “pressing.” If reservoir ranges proceed to say no by the summer season, the town’s subsequent step is the fourth and remaining stage, “emergency.” At that time, industrial customers must steeply curtail water consumption, inflicting main financial disruption.
Disclosure: Exxon Mobil Company and Texas A&M College have been monetary supporters of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan information group that’s funded partially by donations from members, foundations and company sponsors. Monetary supporters play no position within the Tribune’s journalism. Discover a full listing of them right here.
