Water wars in Florida

According to the Natural Resources Defense Council's recent study, Florida is one of 14 states predicted to face "high risk" water shortages by the year 2050.

Metropolitan municipalities in central and south Florida have neared their aquifer extraction limit of 650 million US gallons (2,500,000 m3) per day, leading to the search for new, extra-regional sources.

[2] In 2003, a committee predominantly composed of real estate developers was appointed by Governor Jeb Bush to solve Florida's water disparity.

The Suwannee river region was declared by committee member Lee Arnold to be "sitting in the Saudi Arabia of water.

[2] The council's report offered an incentive for northern regions to transfer water south, suggesting that excess supply may be sold for profit.

Ultimately, more than 30 of the state's counties passed resolutions against the proposal, citing various concerns including overpopulation, uncontrolled development, sink holes, spring depletion, and salinization of groundwater supplies.

Pinellas County continued to cause conflict by refusing to fund alternative water sources and prevented the development of such innovations.

[8][failed verification] With the combined problems of property impacts cited by homeowners, Pinellas County funded a campaign to advertise that the water scarcity issues were from drought not overpumping of aquifers, which was suspected of them.

Tampa Bay Seawater Desalination Plant was originally issued for building in 1997, but after many delays in construction as well as performance failures, it was not fully functioning until 2007.

The Flint River also has its origins near Atlanta and heads southward but is fed by groundwater and has a lower flow than the Chattahoochee.

Out of fear that the river would not be able to maintain such use, Alabama filed a suit against the Army Corps of Engineers in 1990 because they had not assessed the environmental effects of this proposal.

Although the Army Corps of Engineers originally claimed they had enough information initially, it took an additional eight years to complete the study.

The Apalachicola-Chattahoochee-Flint compact allowed each state to review the Army Corps of Engineers study and then come to an agreement about water allocation by December 31, 1998.

At this point, Florida was becoming increasingly frustrated with the lack of progress and with the fact that Georgia would simply not agree to any minimum flow restrictions.

After a series of lawsuits between 2003 and 2008 and record drought in 2007, Georgia's rights to the water in Lake Lanier were denied, stating that the change required congressional approval.