Georgetown is not in danger of running out of water by 2030
In 2022, the City began updating its long-term water and wastewater planning to address faster-than-anticipated growth, modify long-term needs, and recommend steps for securing the additional water sources necessary to meet those needs in the coming years and decades.
Finalized and released publicly in May 2023, the Integrated Water Resource Plan concluded the total baseline demand for water in Georgetown’s approximately 400-square-mile service area—including water used for irrigation—will exceed our current water supply by 2030.
The utility’s current water sources are expected to continue to supply the city in the coming decades, but the population in our utility’s service area is projected to grow significantly. Without a significant new supply, the utility will not run out of water in 2030, but it would most likely have to impose system-wide water restrictions on irrigation year-round with even tighter restrictions during periods of drought.
In August 2023, the City of Georgetown entered into a two-year water reservation agreement with EPCOR securing the utility’s right to buy up to 62.5 million gallons a day of high-quality groundwater from the Carrizo-Wilcox Aquifer — enough water to meet Georgetown’s needs through 2050.
Georgetown is now negotiating a long-term water supply agreement with EPCOR that it expects to finalize next year, providing enough time to build the infrastructure needed to transport and treat groundwater from the Carrizo-Wilcox Aquifer in Robertson County by the time it is needed by the utility in 2030.
Without a water supply deal with EPCOR, the City would need to look at other short and long-term supply options.
It’s important for Georgetown water customers to understand that recent media stories referenced the May 2023 IWRP report and did not reveal any new information concerning Georgetown’s projected water needs or supply by the end of this decade. Projections concerning water supply and demand have not changed since the IWRP was publicly released and posted on the City’s website in May 2023. The City remains confident that we will finalize a long-term water deal with EPCOR next year that will meet our projected demand for water until 2050.
