The Southwest Florida Water Management District Governing Board Tuesday approved a project to reduce groundwater pumping up to 200,000 gallons per day (gpd) at a Manatee County citrus grove.
The Facilitating Agricultural Resource Management Systems (FARMS) program is a cost-share reimbursement program that conserves water and protects water quality.
The FARMS project, proposed by CFI USA, Inc., is located upstream from Lake Manatee on its 332-acre citrus grove. Lake Manatee is a major source of drinking water for the county.
The existing water use permit authorizes an annual average groundwater withdrawal of 286,200 gpd, for the irrigation of the citrus grove.
The goal of this project is to reduce Upper Floridan aquifer groundwater withdrawals through the construction and use of a surface water reservoir. The project design consists of two surface water pump stations, filtration, piping and infrastructure necessary to connect the reservoir into the existing irrigation system.
The FARMS program is jointly funded by state appropriations, the District’s General Fund, the District’s Alafia River, Peace River and Manasota basin boards and the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services.
A total of 3 million gpd of ground water has been conserved through operational FARMS projects. It is anticipated that a total of 8.2 million gpd of ground water will be offset once all 25 current Board-approved FARMS projects are operational. The FARMS Program is expected to reduce groundwater pumping by 40 million gallons per day over the next 20 years.