exTRA by the Trinity River Authority of Texas

Proctor Lake is no stranger to the drought-flood cycles that affect West Texas reservoirs. Reservoir aging has also degraded available fish habitat by siltation, loss of vegetation and breakdown of woody habitat. To tackle the fish habitat issues, Texas Parks & Wildlife Department, Brazos River Authority, US Army Corps of Engineers and B.A.S.S. Nation volunteers worked to create brush piles and eight reef-like areas. About 130 artificial structures and 19 brush piles using bamboo canes were placed in strategic locations.

Friday marked the hottest day of the year so far, but Saturday temperatures are predicted to hit somewhere between 105-110. Tack on a lack of rain for much of the summer and some Central Texans wonder what will come first -- the city increasing the level of water restrictions or a steep bill. Thanks to the lake levels at Lake Buchanan and Travis it’s likely the latter

Plano City Council heard a full report on water rates and upcoming water projects at Monday night’s council meeting. Tom Kula, executive director for North Texas Municipal Water District, presented on projects like the Lower Bois d’Arc Creek Reservoir and others associated with wastewater, water treatment and infrastructure of the water district.

The First Responders Group within the U.S. Department of Homeland Security's Science and Technology Directorate has partnered with the Lower Colorado River Authority (LRCA) to develop a new IoT sensor technology and geo-targeting alerts that will help first responders better respond to floods. The Flood Awareness Apex applies emerging technologies to improve community resilience from flood disasters in order to reduce fatalities and property losses, as well as enhance community-wide resiliency to disruptive flood events.

Mart residents are asked to hold off another day on washing clothes as officials work to address a citywide water shortage. A series of problems with the water system and power outages affecting pumps, compounded by high summer water demand, added up to a shortage the city is scrambling to address, officials said.

A $213 million project aiming to bring water from Caldwell County to the cities of San Marcos, Kyle, Buda and other areas along the I-35 corridor took a step forward yesterday. On Thursday, the Texas Water Development Board approved a commitment to provide $213 million of funding through the State Water Implementation Fund of Texas, or SWIFT, to the Alliance Regional Water Authority, formerly known as the Hays Caldwell Public Utility Agency.

BEAUMONT - The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality has found that some untreated sewage water was discharged into a bayou flowing to Neches River. On May 30, the TCEQ received a complaint that sewage water was coming out of a pipe and spilling into a drainage canal. The Hillebrandt Bayou flows into the Neches River.

Surrounded by the Gulf of Mexico, the Laguna Madre, the Rio Grande, resacas and oxbow lakes, Jude Benavides picked a good place to study water. The Navy veteran and University of Notre Dame and Rice University graduate is an associate professor of Hydrology and Environmental Sciences at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley’s School of Earth, Environmental and Marine Sciences in Brownsville, which also happens to be his hometown.

The waste water treatment center is one very vital piece of infrastructure for any town, but in Eastland it's aging, and according to Eastland City Manager Ron Duncan, it's beginning to fail. "With no redundancies, it's led us to permit violations," Ron stated. More than once a piece of equipment has given out causing a scramble to fix the outdated technology before the plant ran out of storage space. "Basically after 4 days, if we don't get this thing operating, we run into trouble," Ron went on. But not to worry, the Texas Water Development Board has provided grant money totaling over $7,500,000 to the city of Eastland to improve on their waste water treatment plant.

COLLEGE STATION – A summer program at Texas A&M University recently provided 15 undergraduate students with fellowships in water quality to study the impacts of on-site sewage facilities on soil and water quality. The students were from Texas A&M, Prairie View A&M Florida A&M, and Kansas State universities. The two-year undergraduate program is offered by Texas A&M and Prairie View A&M universities and was sponsored by the U.S. Department of Agriculture-National Institute of Food and Agriculture.

ABILENE - At the City Council's media meeting today, the problem of overflowing sewage was addressed, more specifically, fats, oils and grease, also known as "fog." City staffs hopes that the "fog" ordinance will put this sanitary sewage overflow to a stop. The ordinance has taken three years to write. The main target areas are places like restaurants, cafeterias, hotels and nursing homes.

The stakes continue to mount in a legal dispute between the city of Conroe and the San Jacinto River Authority over increases in SJRA water fees as hundreds of thousands of Montgomery County residents are footing the bill. The SJRA is a state agency that works to conserve the water resources of the San Jacinto River watershed. The water authority sells surface water from Lake Conroe to select entities, including Conroe and The Woodlands as a part of a groundwater reduction plan to comply with groundwater regulations in Montgomery County.