Water Shortage?
 

So I see in an online Villages News issue that there is a water shortage for certain areas of the Villages and possible water limitations will be set in future. With that being the case how did a nearby bottling company get approved to bottle many, many gallons of water?

I don't think we need worry. The rainy season is about to begin. The article refers to this site. District Water Restrictions

It is part of a natural cycle

1. It is dry
2. The sky is full of water
3. The sky is falling
4. It is wet

I agree. It appears to be politics as usual. There are numerous studies showing the correlation between increase in development vs. the quantity and quality of the Florida water, and politicians are ignoring the issues. Big business is partly to blame - they have the $$ to successfully lobby the politicians. To say that "the rainy season is coming" is much too simplistic an approach. Florida is one of the fastest growing populations in the country, and the Florida Acquifer is not limitless. Water demand goes up while water supply goes down, and our politicians are on the side of big business, and are ignoring the environmental issues. For example, the state only loosely monitors agricultural practices such as amount of fertilizer used and fertilizer/pollution runoff, which of course contaminates our existing water supply. During Gov. Rick Scott’s term, budget cuts have affected water management districts and the state Department of Environmental Protection, and clean water standards have weakened.Central Florida, with the large amounts of land available for development is projected to incur significant water shortages in the upcoming years, unless we have better water management.

Depends on which side of the issue you want to sit.......the sky is always falling for someone.

It isn't just central Florida for one thing. District Water Restrictions

Politics? NO! It will rain soon. Every day. The water table will rise.

To add that the appointments to these various water boards made by Gov. Scott, are political in nature. Most of the appointments have little or no background in environment management or science. Thus the water bottlers just make their donations........ and start pumping.

:shrug: I'm guessing it involves $$$$$.

The plant is approved to use 496,000 gallons of water daily.
The Villages uses 23 million gallons per day.
The plant will use the same amount of water as 2,156 people.

Probably a year ago so, the sky was falling because Northern California was experiencing a sever drought. Today, the reservoirs are full, there is plenty of water, and record snow pack in the mountains. It will rain in Florida. We may suffer a dry spell, but it will rain regardless of what the politicians do. Just be patient and cut back where you need to. At this point, we have not been asked to cut back on water usage.

A year or two after I moved here, Florida was declared in a state of drought. This lasted for a couple of years. Yet, it was only recommended that water be conserved, no real enforcement. Florida (and Floridians) seems to not quite understand the need to conserve water. California learned the hard way when it lost a few aquifers. Hopefully, we'll learn from its mistakes, but I doubt it.

I agree. It is the job of governments, as custodians of the public trust , to protect water resources for the public’s benefit. Allowing bottled water companies to consume Florida’s water resources, when our country faces an impending water shortage, is a breach of public trust. And add to that, the public is uneducated, and doesn't see the ramifications of allowing private enterprise to use state natural resources for their own monetary benefit, and doesn't even recognize the environmental hazards created (think the millions of plastic bottles that will hold the water). The acquifers and rivers are in trouble because people have been consuming their available water faster than it can be regularly replenished with rain; and they lack sufficient restraint or regulatory controls to keep this from happening - hence we have a conundrum.