CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas — City Manager Peter Zanoni and other city leaders, announced Tuesday that the city is officially following Stage 2 water restrictions.
"These measures are essential to conserve water and to mitigate the impact of continued drought conditions," Mayor Paulette Guajardo said during a news conference.
The requirement means you can only use a sprinkler to water your yard once every other week on your trash day.
As far as heavy industrial water users, they're not affected at all.
"The large volume users do not have any curtailment in stages one and two or stage three," Zanoni said. "However, in stage three, there's an additional surcharge that can be applied to the cost of water to them."
The highest water use is during the summer months. That's when the O.N. Stevens Water Treatment Plant producing up to 110 million gallons of water a day. Residential and commercial customers use a little over half of that water while heavy industrial users take the rest.
"Industry is always conserving because the water costs them money and so if they're using millions of gallons of water a day, then that breaks into their profit model."
City manager Zanoni said, one of those companies is Gulf Coast Growth Ventures in Gregory.
"They use different technologies, different processes to actually use less water," he said. "Initially their take or pay contract was close to 20 million gallons a day, but they are seeing a massive reduction in the water they use."
Zanoni said that Exxon plant has been able to shave off several million gallons of water from its daily use. While that's welcome news to everyone, Isabel Araiza co-founder of local environmental group For the Greater Good also wants to see heavy industrial water users being forced to cut back.
"What the city needs to do is end the drought exemption," Araiza said. "They have the power to do that even if they end it, there's still this window of five years where the drought exemption will be allowed to persist. So, that's the first thing that needs to happen."
City manager Zanoni said the city is working quickly to add a daily capacity of another 125 million gallons of water a day to ensure everyone has plenty of water.
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