Texas Living Waters Project
Working to Ensure Water for People & Wildlife

How to manage Texas’ fresh water resources is one of the most critical issues facing the state. Texas’ population is projected to double over the next fifty years, meanwhile many sources of fresh water—our rivers and underground aquifers—are already overtaxed. 

Some of Texas’ rivers would go dry today if everyone with a legal claim to the water actually used all of that water. Some aquifers are being pumped many times faster than rainfall can replenish them, causing springs to go dry and depriving rivers and streams of the critical “base flows” that come from those springs.

To learn more, visit the Texas Living Waters Project website: http://www.texaswatermatters.org/ To get involved or request a presentation, contact Jennifer Ellis at 512-610-7756.

All of this spells trouble for fish and wildlife, and ultimately for people too. If our use of water makes rivers dry up, aquifers drop, wetlands disappear, and estuaries get too salty, then the birds, fish, mammals and countless other creatures that depend on these waters will suffer. As wildlife populations decline, so will the economic activity they generate—in commercial and sport fishing, hunting, bird watching, outdoor recreation, and tourism. We don’t have to let this happen. We can supply water for human needs and still maintain a healthy environment. And we owe it to our children and grandchildren to do just that.

The Texas Living Waters Project is a joint effort by the National Wildlife Federation, the Lone Star Chapter of the Sierra Club and Environmental Defense to reform the way Texas manages and uses its fresh water. Our goal is to ensure that environmental water needs—the water needed to support healthy fish and wildlife populations—are recognized and supplied along with municipal, industrial, and agricultural needs.

The Texas Living Waters Project focuses on influencing these areas of water policy and management:

Flowing Rivers: Existing Texas water law does not ensure that Texas’ rivers will keep flowing. In many rivers, the state has given out permits to take more water out than would actually be in the river during dry times. The National Wildlife Federation is working towards collaborative solutions so we can meet the water needs of Texans while sustaining healthy, flowing rivers. New legislation passed in 2007, [insert link to TWM content] with support from NWF, launches a new effort to determine environmental flow needs and to begin to meet them.

Coastal Bays and Estuaries: On the Gulf Coast of Texas, there are seven major coastal estuaries formed where fresh water from rivers flows into the saltier water of the Gulf of Mexico. This unique habitat is critical for many different kinds of wildlife such as fish, shrimp, oysters, crabs, and migratory birds. To learn more, read “Bays in Peril,” our 2004 report on the outlook for Texas’ bays. The National Wildlife Federation is working to make sure that our bays get the freshwater they need to stay healthy and sustain wildlife.

Reservoirs: Because building a dam on a river floods important wildlife habitat and holds back much of the river’s flow, it is a very expensive and environmentally damaging way to provide water. At the National Wildlife Federation, we believe the state should only build more dams when there are no other better water supply alternatives. The current 2007 State Water Plan calls for 16 new reservoirs to be constructed over the next 50 years. Many, perhaps most, of these reservoirs could be avoided with smarter water planning. NWF is working to influence Texas’ water planning so we make the best choices for current and future Texans.

Water Conservation: As Texas grows, the state cannot afford to continue to use water inefficiently. Water conservation has significant potential in Texas that has yet to be tapped. As our 2007 report “Save Water, Save Rivers, Save Money” shows, increased municipal water conservation could save as much water as all 16 of the new dams proposed in the current State Water Plan.  Right now, the state’s water policies do not do enough to encourage making the most efficient use of existing water supplies before new supplies are developed. The National Wildlife Federation is working to change that.

Groundwater: Over half of the water used in Texas comes from aquifers that are underground—“groundwater.” Right now many aquifers are being pumped faster than rainfall can replenish them, which has caused many of Texas’ springs to stop flowing. Over time, this over-pumping will reduce the amount of water available for people and wildlife. The National Wildlife Federation and our partner organizations are working to make sure Texas water laws and policies protect our groundwater by advocating for the sustainable use of these supplies—using it only as fast as nature can replenish it—so current and future generations will have healthy and reliable groundwater resources. 

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