Regional Reservoirs
SAWS currently has two surface water projects in and around Bexar County that help meet SAWS’ yearly demand. In 2022, SAWS produced about 3 percent of its total demand from these surface water supplies.
Canyon Lake
This surface water project was established in April 2006, delivering treated water from Canyon Lake to customers in Northwest and North Central San Antonio.
The Western Canyon project is a successful alliance between the GBRA (Guadalupe-Blanco River Authority) and water purveyors in Comal, Kendall and Bexar counties. SAWS has an agreement to receive a minimum of 4,000 acre-feet per year. In 2021, SAWS received about 8,000 acre-feet which supplied approximately 32,000 households.
Lake Dunlap
Water from Lake Dunlap continues to serve northeast San Antonio. It is located on the Guadalupe River east of the city of New Braunfels and is made possible through an agreement with Canyon Regional Water Authority (CRWA).
SAWS has an agreement to receive up to 4,000 acre-feet per year of treated surface water from Lake Dunlap through the end of 2023 at which time the water volume is returned in basin and CRWA replaces this volume to SAWS with groundwater supplies. In 2021, CRWA delivered SAWS approximately 3,000 acre-feet of Lake Dunlap water, enough to supply 13,000 households.
Terms
Firm yield – The volume of water which can be produced from a defined source during a repeat of the drought of record under existing regulatory, legal, contractual, hydrological or infrastructure constraints
1 acre-foot per year = 325,851 gallons