In a water-starved state like Texas, it’s a good idea to know your drought level and—if you get your water from a surface lake—your local lake level.
Your Water Supply: Drought Areas and Lake Levels
Awareness of how full or empty your water source is can be an inspiration for reducing your daily water usage.
Drought
Many parts of Texas are often in a state of drought. This map from the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration is updated each Thursday to show the location and intensity of drought across the state. It uses a five-category, color-coded system to illustrate a drought’s intensity. It ranges from “abnormally dry” in bright yellow to “exceptional drought” in brown. You can also click on individual counties for more localized information.
Where Does Your Water Come From?
If your drinking water comes from a lake, reservoir, or any kind of surface water, it’s always helpful to understand just how much or how little water remains in your lake. Not sure where your water comes from? We’ve compiled a list of many of the larger lakes that supply drinking water to Texans. You can also find statewide water data from the Texas Water Development Board.
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If you live in Austin or the surrounding area, you likely get your water from Lake Travis or Lake Buchanan. However, rain must fall in just the right area for it to fill up the lakes effectively. Despite the rains we received in the spring and early summer, Lake Travis was still only around 77% full as of August 2021.
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The Lower Colorado River Authority, the body that operates the Colorado River and Highland Lake system, also provides a daily update on all the Highland Lakes as well as an overall percentage of how full they are.
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Those in the Dallas area get their water from several reservoirs. These include Lake Fork, Grapevine Lake, Lavon Lake, Lewisville Lake, Lake Ray Hubbard, Ray Roberts Lake, and Lake Tawakoni. The Texas Water Development Board has a website that graphically displays the current total capacity and levels of all the lakes.
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Most of Houston’s supply flows from the Trinity River into Lake Livingston, and from the San Jacinto River into Lake Conroe and Lake Houston.
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Like Dallas, most of Fort Worth’s water supply comes from surface lakes. These lakes from the West Fork system include Lake Bridgeport, Eagle Mountain Lake and Lake Worth. The East Texas reservoirs are Cedar Creek, Richland-Chambers, and Benbrook Lake.
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Waco and the surrounding areas get their water from Lake Waco, which is fed by the Bosque River.
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If you live in Abilene, you get your water from three local reservoirs: Fort Phantom Hill Reservoir, the Hubbard Creek Reservoir, and the O. H. Ivie Reservoir.
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Those who live in the Corpus Christi area receive their water from Lake Corpus Christi and the Choke Canyon Reservoir system.
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Living on South Padre Island means that you get your water from Amistad Reservoir and the Falcon Reservoir. Both bodies of water are quite low right now. Please do everything you can to conserve water if you live in this area.
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The City of San Angelo has five surface water sources: O.H. Ivie Reservoir, Lake Spence, O.C. Fisher Reservoir, Twin Buttes Reservoir and Lake Nasworthy.
We can all do our part to conserve water. Get started with the Texas Trickle! Remember, every drop counts, especially when water is restricted due to drought conditions.
