- Corpus Christi is a city on the Texas Gulf Coast located close to water hungry industries in the drought plagued state, attracting multiple proposals to build desalination plants that would turn saltwater into freshwater for plastic manufacturers and other industrial end users.
- Desalination uses a lot of energy but also produces brine, which can be twice as salty as seawater and can contain elevated levels of heavy metals.
- This brine is set to be pumped back into Corpus Christi Bay or further out into the Gulf of Mexico, causing an array of stakeholders from the fishing community to birdwatchers to oppose the ‘desal’ plants.
- The director of one of the grassroots action groups discusses the situation in an interview with Mongabay.
Corpus Christi is a city of 316,000 residents on Texas’s Coastal Bend, a rich marine area along the Gulf of Mexico. Located close to multiple water hungry industries, this city located in a drought-plagued state is also home to multiple proposals to build desalination plants that would turn abundant saltwater into freshwater for plastic manufacturers and other industrial end users. This requires a lot of energy but also produces brine, which can be twice as salty as seawater and can contain elevated levels of heavy metals.
Corpus Christi Bay is home to myriad fish, mammal, and shorebird species, including threatened and endangered ones, so the five desalination plants proposed – each of which would siphon tens of millions of gallons of water daily from the bay and then pump the extra salty water laced with metals back into the bay – have been met with stiff opposition.
Cyndi Valdes is just one of the activists organizing against the ‘desal’ plans. In her role as Coastal Watch Association’s Executive Director, she’s constantly organizing and educating people about the issue, and spends long hours in the city’s meeting rooms to provide comment on the numerous proposals and related permits being issued for such projects. She responded to Mongabay’s questions via email, and her answers have been edited lightly for brevity.
Mongabay: Last year, Sierra published a feature about all the desalination proposals for your area – “Corpus Christi says it needs extra water. But it’s for fossil fuel and plastic corporations – not people” – what’s happened since then?
Cyndi Valdes: The City of Corpus Christi is moving forward with its plans for the Inner Harbor Desalination Project and has expressed interest in partnering with the Port of Corpus Christi Authority. The City has selected Kiewit Infrastructure South Co. to design and build the $757.6 million plant. Recently, the Nueces River Authority informed the Port of Corpus Christi it wants to negotiate a long-term lease for the Harbor Island location, build a desal plant and use the permits the Port has already obtained. Finally, the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) reissued a permit to Corpus Christi Polymers after its original permit expired.
Mongabay: Seems like grassroots organizing has been effective at exposing what the impacts of these projects would be, as one activist told the reporter, “Sometimes dozens of permits are issued in a week. Our strategy has been simple: Challenge everything and try to force public hearings.” Is such grassroots pressure and ‘shining light into the dark corners’ remaining effective?
Cyndi Valdes: Not only is our organization diligently monitoring TCEQ permits, we work closely with many other grassroots groups along the Gulf Coast to make the public aware that TCEQ is in the business of writing permits, not protecting our environment. We have successfully rallied hundreds of Coastal Bend residents to attend and make public comment at numerous TCEQ hearings over the past three years. Once the public witnesses the impunity with which the TCEQ operates, their outrage only increases.
Mongabay: From an ecological point of view, it seems like a poor idea to pump millions of gallons of brine into the bay. What are the likely effects on marine life, birds and such creatures? Does the proposal to move such discharge out into the Gulf of Mexico mollify you at all, or is it just moving the harm?
Cyndi Valdes: Desalination brine, when returned to the Gulf of Mexico, poses significant environmental risks:
- Increased Salinity: The concentrated brine increases the salt content in the discharge area, stressing marine organisms not adapted to high salinity.
- Oxygen Depletion: Brine can displace oxygen-rich water, reducing oxygen levels in the seabed and impacting bottom-dwelling creatures.
- Chemical Contaminants: Desalination processes may introduce chemicals like anti-fouling agents into the brine, further harming marine life.
- Impact on Sensitive Species: Certain species, such as juvenile fish or corals, are particularly vulnerable to the effects of concentrated brine.
Mongabay: With the election of a very fossil fuel- and corporation-friendly new president, how do you anticipate the debate over this issue will shift?
Cyndi Valdes: The need to protect the environment remains critical, regardless of political changes. What concerns us is that the City of Corpus Christi, the Port and the Nueces River Authority no longer even pretend that the water desal will allegedly produce is for residents of the Coastal Bend – they readily acknowledge the intended consumers are heavy industry. With a Trump Administration, fossil fuel companies will once again be unmoored from any kind of restraint or concern about the threats of climate change.
Mongabay: Does your coalition want to stop all potential desalination proposals or do you see room for negotiation on that? What’s your alternative view for the city and the bay vs increased industrialization and pollution?
Cyndi Valdes: Some of our coalition members are not emphatically against any form of desal. Some are willing to consider desal if the plants are in the right location and discharge is pumped offshore into the Gulf of Mexico. Others in our coalition are steadfastly opposed to any kind of desal, because the numbers indicate that there is plenty of water, just not enough water for fossil fuel companies that consume hundreds of millions of gallons a day of water.
The City of Corpus Christi and other governmental entities continue to peddle the lie that heavy industry brings ‘good paying jobs’ to the Coastal Bend, but the education and healthcare sectors of our region are our biggest employers. The Coastal Bend is a tremendous tourist draw, and recreational and commercial fishing are pivotal industries here.
Our view is to support these industries, not the fossil fuel sector. Our bay, and the tourism businesses it attracts, will be destroyed if leaders continue to turn the Coastal Bend into Baytown.
Erik Hoffner is an editor, podcast producer & photojournalist for Mongabay, find his work and words at Bluesky and Instagram.
Related audio from Mongabay’s podcast: How implementation of a new treaty to manage and conserve the oceans suffers from a rebranding effort, listen here:
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