Laredo, McAllen, Brownsville, Harlingen and other Rio Grande Valley cities that have faced severe drought conditions this year have implemented water restrictions, but building moratoriums are uncommon.<\/p>\n
The small Collin County city of Princeton halted new construction for 120 days in 2024 while it evaluated whether its water and wastewater systems could keep up with explosive growth. The San Marcos City Council voted in June to ban data centers citywide, the first in Texas to do so. Projects have been delayed in Dripping Springs and Hutto due to water capacity concerns.<\/p>\n
Harris, Montgomery and Fort Bend counties have also experienced severe droughts in recent years and implemented sporadic watering restrictions, but Houston\u2019s biggest challenge has been its aging infrastructure, not a lack of supply, at least in the short term.<\/p>\n
Environmentalists point out that a subdivision of 100 homes might use roughly 300,000 to 1 million gallons of water on site during construction, whereas an industrial project like a medium-sized AI data center can use up to 500,000 gallons of water per day.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Since 2013, Texas has been providing tax incentives<\/a> for data centers but Gov. Greg Abbott suggested last month that instead of just regulating the industrial facilities and ensuring they provide their own electric infrastructure and water-efficient cooling systems, data centers shouldn\u2019t be built in rural neighborhoods at all due to the amount of water and power they use.\u00a0<\/p>\n Even with the recent rains, Corpus Christi is operating under Stage 3<\/a> drought conditions, meaning lawn watering and automatic irrigation systems are prohibited, and residents who ignore the restrictions can be assessed a $500 fine per violation per day. Residents can water trees, vegetable beds, shrubs and potted plants with a hand-held hose before 10 a.m. or after 6 p.m.\u00a0<\/p>\n The water crisis has become a political hot potato, with Corpus Christi elected officials sparring recently over whether to apply for up to $120 million in federal grants to partially fund a $979 million water desalination plant. The measure was voted down 5-4 on June 30. At the meeting, Council Member Carolyn Vaughn, who said she thought debating the federal grant funding was a waste of time, accused<\/a> her colleague Roland Barrera of calling her and others \u201cstupid\u201d on a radio show and said Barrera\u2019s comment was childish.\u00a0<\/p>\n Vaughn has said publicly that she\u2019s not opposed to desalination but she wants the city to pursue a project that is financially responsible and transparent before committing nearly $1 billion in public funds. Barrera has supported desalination as a long-term, drought-resistant water supply solution.<\/p>\n Environmentalists opposed to a Corpus Christi desalination plant, which could treat about 30 million gallons of seawater per day, say they\u2019re concerned about costs and environmental impacts from salty discharge into the Corpus Christi Bay.\u00a0They also say they believe the treated water will be used to support tax-exempt industries, not help residents who only use about 13 percent of the city\u2019s water supply.<\/p>\n So Corpus Christi \u2014 home to more than 317,000 residents and a hot spot for thousands of spring breakers and vacationers each year \u2014 has challenges, but it\u2019s also a burgeoning site for buyers in the market for a second home, says Terence Johnson, vice president of development for Houston-based Ashlar Development.\u00a0<\/p>\n Ashlar is creating the 240-acre Whitecap NPI<\/a> luxury housing project on land that previously served as a golf course and a failed Schlitterbahn water park. Johnson says developers are not using potable \u2014 filtered, treated drinking water \u2014 while Whitecap is under construction and they had no problems securing permits from the city.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe have \u2018no potable water in use\u2019 and \u2018well water in use\u2019 signs all over the place,\u201d he said. \u201cWhen we first started irrigating, we didn\u2019t have the signs up and people were seeing water going everywhere. We did get a couple of calls, so we had to publicize it and put the signs up.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Johnson told the Houston Press that developers are creating a mixed-use site that will include 500 residences, a hotel, entertainment district, marina district, bars, restaurants, retail space and a nature preserve. Lots are already being scooped up and the owners can choose their own builders to construct homes in the $1 million to $2 million range. The city\u2019s water conservation restrictions are effective for the homeowner once they take possession of the property.\u00a0<\/p>\n Johnson said he couldn\u2019t answer how much water is being used on the development but advised that \u201cit\u2019s not that much,\u201d acknowledging that water usage for a new mixed-use development is primarily for landscaping and mixing concrete.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe can use city water as we\u2019re establishing our plants for construction, but then once they\u2019re established, we have to cut back and follow those guidelines,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019ve always looked at our development as being off the grid. We\u2019re implementing solar. We\u2019re implementing groundwater reclamation and doing water wells for our irrigation. We wanted to show the rest of the island how these things can be implemented to help us all in a cost-effective way for residents.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Drip irrigation is used on most of the landscaping so water trickles into the soil several times a day, Johnson added.\u00a0<\/p>\n Kathleen Thompson, executive director of the Dallas-based media company Progress Texas<\/a>, visited Corpus Christi for the Democratic Party Convention in late June and said she was surprised that restaurants served water in regular-sized glasses and no signs were posted around the short-term rental where she stayed advising to \u201cuse water wisely\u201d or think about the length of your shower.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThere was no messaging to outsiders about the crisis that they\u2019re in,\u201d Thompson said. \u201cUnless you\u2019re following the news, how would you know?\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Thompson said the situation reminds her of a severe Texas drought and devastating wildfires in 2011 that prompted then-Gov. Rick Perry to plead with Texans to \u201cpray for rain.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s sad and it\u2019s laughable that the public policy then was prayer when we actually hold the keys to the power in this state and can not only deal with a drought that\u2019s happening now but droughts that we know will come,\u201d she said. \u201cCity council members and state lawmakers have had all this time, knowing this was coming, but instead have been working on voucher schemes and who can go to the bathroom where. Water policy could save people\u2019s lives. It\u2019s been more than a decade [since Perry\u2019s call for prayer] and I don\u2019t see that the focus has changed enough for people who are in political power.\u201d<\/p>\n Matthew Kennedy, petrochemical campaign coordinator with Austin-based Texas Campaign for the Environment, pointed out in his \u201cWater for People, Not Polluters<\/a>\u201d initiative that his opposition toward development in areas experiencing water shortages is aimed at the rapid construction and expansion of petrochemical plants, refineries, and multi-billion dollar desalination projects designed to feed those industries.\u00a0<\/p>\n According to the Corpus Christi website<\/a>, the city has for 130 years been a regional water provider for the seven-county Coastal Bend area, a responsibility Kennedy says has been abused.<\/p>\n \u201cInstead of prioritizing the repair of crumbling infrastructure, higher quality standards for potable water or affordability for small users, Corpus Christi has instead focused on collaborating with polluting industries to create sweetheart deals for the region\u2019s heaviest water users,\u201d he said. \u201cThe result? Repeated water boils and bans, higher bills and drought restrictions and fines for residential users.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Beatriz Alvarado, a Corpus Christi-based water campaign organizer for Texas Campaign for the Environment, said residents are mostly concerned that their usage is being restricted while their water bills are doubling and tripling, and there appear to be no repercussions for the companies that are placing the most demand on the system.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cOur problem stems from decisions by the city to oversell our water supply some years back,\u201d Alvarado said. \u201cThere was a lot of pushback from the community on desalination because there were some community members who realized who the water was for. It wasn\u2019t for the residents; it was for the industrial companies.\u201d<\/p>\n When a consultant revealed last year that the reservoirs were getting low in a shorter time frame than expected, city officials \u201cstarted piling on the water projects to address a mostly industrial demand,\u201d Alvarado said. \u201cAnother problem we\u2019ve come across is unfettered water use. We\u2019re under drought restrictions but industry has an exemption. They\u2019re able to pay a small fee to avoid surcharges.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n More than 12,000 people have signed a petition to place the Fair Water Amendmen<\/a>t on a November ballot. If approved, it would ensure that \u201cbig industrial users\u201d would face the same fines and surcharges for excessive water use during drought conditions that residents, small businesses, schools and hospitals do.\u00a0<\/p>\n Some Corpus Christi City Council members have said the city must protect its industrial economy and that refineries and petrochemical plants provide jobs, tax revenue and economic activity, according to the Associated Press<\/a>. They\u2019ve also said that abruptly reducing the water supply to those industries could have major economic consequences.<\/p>\n Alvarado, who has lived in Corpus Christi for 18 years, said a little tax revenue doesn\u2019t justify putting residents in debt.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe hope that the city realizes that it\u2019s not all about exponential growth, especially when it comes to a resource like water,\u201d she said. \u201cPolitically we would like to have a say on how fast that moves because we\u2019re seeing the consequences of it but that\u2019s not where our council is at right now.\u201d<\/p>\n Journalist\u00a0 Kamran Rosen with the More Perfect Union<\/a>, a progressive, nonprofit media organization \u2014 which describes itself as \u201cexplicitly biased\u201d toward the working class and labor unions \u2014 says in a June 2026 video<\/a> that Corpus Christi will be the first American city to run out of water.\u00a0<\/p>\n According to Rosen, surface water such as lakes and rivers is legally under the state\u2019s jurisdiction. \u201cThis means permits for water usage are managed through layered state organizations, all of which are appointed by the governor. This gives the governor immense power in shaping water use, power that Governor Abbott has used for a decade to pick pro-industry appointees who have handed out permit after permit to big business, largely oil and gas.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n One such permit was issued in 2019 to the Gulf Coast Growth Ventures petrochemical facility run by ExxonMobil and Saudi Arabia\u2019s SABIC that is the single largest water consumer in Corpus Christi, using nearly as much water as all residents combined, Rosen says.\u00a0<\/p>\n Thompson pointed out that Texas has a $27 billion rainy day fund and a budget surplus and could bail out struggling municipalities. \u201cThis isn\u2019t an emergency yet but it could be,\u201d she said of the Corpus Christi situation. \u201cIt doesn\u2019t make sense. I\u2019m disappointed to see the news coverage about the fighting that\u2019s happening rather than solutions and coming together.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tRelated<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Even as Corpus Christi residents have been told they can\u2019t water their lawns, an $800 million housing development…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":375398,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[132736,132737,155,157,156,392,226,132738,132739,41120],"class_list":["post-375397","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-corpus-christi","tag-ashlar-development","tag-beatriz-alvarado","tag-corpus-christi","tag-corpus-christi-headlines","tag-corpus-christi-news","tag-greg-abbott","tag-homepage","tag-kathleen-thompson","tag-terence-johnson","tag-water-crisis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/375397","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=375397"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/375397\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/375398"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=375397"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=375397"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=375397"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/Future-Mixed-Use-2.jpg\")
Renderings show plans for million-dollar homes in a mixed-use development on Corpus Christi\u2019s North Padre Island. Credit: Ashlar Development<\/p>\n