Hey, a lot has happened over the past three months so here’s a quick rundown of the latest developments. 

On September 2nd, City Council voted to cancel their contract with Kiewit to design and build the Inner Harbor project, mostly due to the high price tag. Later that month, the Texas Foundation for Conservation released an independent assessment of the Inner Harbor’s modeling, detailing the inadequacies of using CORMIX to model brine discharges into complex estuarine environments. Dr. Valle-Levinson wrote the report, he teaches at the University of Florida and has written books on Estuarine Hydrodynamics (report linked below). 

Last week, the City Manager for Corpus Christi made two major announcements regarding the Inner Harbor project. First is that the project will be coming to City Council again for a vote on whether they want to proceed with a different entity to design the project, hoping to build it at a cheaper cost, and second is that a new far field study for the project will be developed with input and feedback from community members and experts from local universities. 

While the announcement of additional modeling is great news, it does raise some concerns, mostly to do with the proposed timeline of the project and whether there is enough time for the modeling results to make a difference. According to the timeline in CCW’s presentation for this Tuesday, Council will vote on drafting a contract with Corpus Christi Desal Partners as early as January of 2026, giving little time for a model to be developed and reviewed before the design-build contract is drafted. This potentially creates a situation where key project details could be set in stone before the modeling results have been reviewed, making important changes much more difficult to implement later on down the line. 

Either way, I recommend checking out the links below to learn more about the latest developments. As always, thank you for staying up to date, please share our petition with a friend, and be sure to reach out to the Mayor and to your Councilmembers to let them know how you feel about the Inner Harbor project. Cheers, 

Jason

City Council votes to stop work on Inner Harbor Desalination Project (KIII-TV)

Comments on “TECHNICAL MEMORANDUM; Texas Registered Engineering Firm F-13; City of Corpus Christi Desalination Study; Concentrate Modeling at Inner Harbor; Channel TPDES Permit No.: WQ0005289000; (Version 2.0 DRAFT)” by To, reviewed by Morrison, Cocklin, Arroyo and Buzan.

Inner Harbor Desalination Project returns to Council agenda after September vote (KRIS-TV)

Corpus Christi contracts far-field study for Inner Harbor Desalination plans (KIII-TV)