![]() ![]() ![]() The race for desalination comes during a crippling drought, especially in Central Texas, where most of the springs that feed the rivers that run to the Gulf Coast have run dry. On top of all this, the proposed Corpus Christi Polymer & Desalination Plant – a proposed petrochemical manufacturing plant with an attached desalination facility – would release up to 1,048 tons per year of potentially health-damaging air pollutants, including 79 tons per year of particulate matter and 202 tons per year of volatile organic compounds, according to public records in the Oil & Gas Watch database. All told, the six desalination plants – if built – could discharge more than 362 million gallons of brine per day. The City of Corpus Christi’s La Quinta Channel plant would discharge 91 million gallons of brine a day, and the port’s desalination plant on La Quinta Channel would release another 57 million gallons. They believe the projects will hike residents’ water bills to serve a massive industry expansion, all while dumping highly concentrated brine with heavy metals into the bays and estuaries where they fish, paddle, windsurf, and swim.įor example, the Port of Corpus Christi’s proposed Harbor Island desalination plant would discharge 96 million gallons of concentrated saltwater (brine) per day, according to public records reviewed by Oil & Gas Watch. Local watchdog groups and environmentalists are fighting the plants. The plans for the six desalination facilities, combined, show a 33-fold increase in water demand from heavy industry, according to the regional water plan for the Coastal Bend. But records show that industry is clearly driving demand. The facility is one of at least six desalination plants planned for Corpus Christi and surrounding refinery hubs and tourist towns, a region known as the Texas Coastal Bend.Ĭity officials claim that desalination is for everyone and the right solution to the region’s water woes. “Now they want to put desalination here.” The neighborhood, once filled with homes and small businesses, is where the City of Corpus Christi plans a desalination plant that can treat up to 30 million gallons per day of water from the Gulf of Mexico, removing the salt so the freshwater can be used by local industries and residents. “This was supposed to be a buffer zone,” Carrington said of the land, a patch of empty lots standing between the industry and a few remaining occupied houses. To his left, storage tanks owned by Flint Hills Resources rose over a channel dug for massive tanker ships. Behind him rose the stacks of a Citgo refinery. ![]() CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas – Adam Carrington, pastor of Brooks AME Worship Center, stood on a patch of grass in Hillcrest, the remnants of a once-thriving neighborhood now surrounded by oil refineries and other heavy industry. ![]()
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