Estimated Water Use Report - Southwest Florida Water ...

2005 Estimated Water Use Report
Introduction
This report presents estimated freshwater use
within the Southwest Florida Water
Management District (District) for 2005
calendar year. Reclaimed water is excluded in
this report but the 2005 Annual Alternative
Reuse Report for the Southwest Florida Water
Management District can be obtained by
calling the District’s Conservation Projects
Section at 352-796-7211, Extension 4285.
The District relies on the Estimated Water Use
Reports as a reference document for assistance
with regulatory issues, water supply planning
and development, review of water
conservation programs, and evaluation of
state-mandated comprehensive plans and
impact studies of new development. Local
and state government agencies, water utilities,
various trade organizations, environmental
groups, and other interested parties also find
this data to be informative.
The District is one of five regional agencies
charged with monitoring, regulating,
managing, and protecting water resources in
the state of Florida. Jurisdictional boundaries
for the five water management districts are
based on hydrologic features, such as
watershed drainage basins, which may or may
not coincide with county boundaries. The
District encompasses all or part of the
following sixteen (16) counties: Charlotte,
Citrus, DeSoto, Hardee, Hernando, Highlands,
Hillsborough, Lake, Levy, Marion, Manatee,
Pasco, Pinellas, Polk, Sarasota and Sumter.
Figure 1 illustrates the sixteen (16) full and
partial counties, which are within the District’s
jurisdiction. Data for each partial county only
include the water use for that portion of the
county within the District. Since 1989, the
District has identified four geographic areas of
special concern that have shown long term
declines in hydrologic conditions. These four
areas are designated “Water Use Caution
Areas” (WUCAs, Figure 2) and referred to as
Highlands Ridge WUCA, Eastern Tampa Bay
WUCA, Northern Tampa Bay WUCA (Figure 3)
and Southern WUCA (Figure 4).
In this report, estimated water use data are
examined for six broad categories: Public
Supply, Domestic Self-supply,
Recreational/Aesthetic, Agriculture,
Mining/Dewatering, and
Industrial/Commercial. For all use categories
except Public Supply, water use in this report is
equivalent to water withdrawn from either
surface or ground water sources. For Public
Supply, actual water use can be different from
the amount of water withdrawn, since system
treatment losses and water used for
environmental mitigation are accounted for in
the Public Supply category. In addition, water
used for Public Supply purposes is sometimes
transferred from one permit to another. In this
case, the first permit “withdraws” the water
while the second permit “uses” the water.
In order to provide the reader with specific use
data (i.e. citrus water use under the
Agricultural Category), use code information
was obtained for each permit. However, the
data contained within the summary tables of
each chapter should be used with discretion.
In the event a permit has multiple use codes
(i.e., strawberry and field crop); only a single
code could be selected. Regulatory database
comparisons were performed as a check on
the quantities listed under each use code
classification. In general, the estimated use
code data presented in the report should be
used only to roughly gauge specific water use
activities.
Total water use in the District is also studied.
Unless otherwise indicated, data is reported as
an annual average daily rate in million gallons
per day (mgd). For those counties which are
only partially within District boundaries,
(Charlotte, Highlands, Lake, Levy, Marion and
Polk), the estimates include only water use
data for portions of those counties which are
within the District. When possible, the source
of water is also identified to be ground water
or surface water.
Four appendices are located at the back of this
report. Appendix A contains detailed lists of
Southwest Florida Water Management District
4