WATER SCARCITY

Water scarcity in the United States: where the water problems are and why they are growing

Where U.S. water problems are most acute, what drives water stress — drought, groundwater depletion, growth and new demand like data centers — and how to read water risk for a site.

By Argos Tellus · Updated October 1, 2026

KEY TAKEAWAYS

USGS’s National Water Availability Assessment found about 8% of the conterminous U.S. population — 26.7 million people — live in areas with chronic stress from imbalances between water supply and use.
The most stressed regions include the Southern and Central High Plains, much of Texas, the Desert Southwest, California’s Central Valley and the Mississippi Embayment.
In a 2014 GAO survey, water managers in 40 of 50 states expected freshwater shortages somewhere in their state within ten years under average conditions.
Groundwater is the buffer that hides scarcity until it runs short: about half of Americans drink it, and it carries most of the load during droughts.
New large users — AI data centers, manufacturing and fast-growing cities — are increasingly siting in exactly these water-stressed regions.

What water scarcity means in the U.S.

Water scarcity is not only a lack of rain. Hydrologists distinguish physical scarcity (not enough water in the system), water stress (demand taking a large share of available supply), and economic or infrastructure scarcity (water exists but is too costly or too poor in quality to deliver). Most U.S. water problems are stress problems: withdrawals that are sustainable in a wet year become unsustainable in a dry one.

The World Resources Institute’s Aqueduct framework, for example, classifies a basin as “high” stress when withdrawals take 40–80% of available renewable supply and “extremely high” above 80%.

Where are water problems most acute?

The USGS National Water Availability Assessment (water years 2010–20) mapped where supply and use are chronically out of balance. Stress is concentrated in the arid and semi-arid West and in heavily irrigated regions:

Southern and Central High Plains — irrigation from the Ogallala aquifer exceeds recharge; see groundwater depletion.
Texas — rapid population growth, recurring drought and heavy reliance on groundwater; Texas’s state water plans project large shortages in a repeat of the drought of record (see Texas groundwater).
Desert Southwest and the Colorado River basin — over-allocated surface water and low-recharge groundwater basins in Arizona, Nevada and New Mexico (see Arizona groundwater).
California’s Central Valley — groundwater overdraft during droughts and associated land subsidence.
Mississippi Embayment — irrigation pumping from the alluvial aquifer, even in a region with high rainfall.

What is driving U.S. water stress?

Drought and heat — higher temperatures raise evaporation and irrigation demand while reducing runoff and recharge.
Groundwater depletion — long-term overdraft lowers the buffer that carries regions through droughts.
Population and economic growth — especially in the Sun Belt, where growth is fastest and water is tightest.
New industrial demand — AI and cloud data centers, semiconductor fabs and energy projects concentrate large, round-the-clock demand at single sites.
Water quality — contamination such as PFAS, nitrate or salinity removes usable supply or raises its treatment cost.

Why groundwater is the hidden half of the problem

Surface-water shortages are visible — low reservoirs, dry rivers, curtailment orders. Groundwater shortages are not. When surface supplies fail, users pump more groundwater, and the deficit shows up years later as falling water tables, failing wells and subsidence.

About 140 million Americans rely on groundwater for drinking water, according to USGS, and groundwater supplies close to half of U.S. irrigation water. That makes aquifer condition — not just rainfall or reservoir levels — the deciding factor in long-term water security for most of the country’s water-stressed regions.

How to read water risk for a specific site

Regional stress maps tell you where to look; they do not tell you whether a particular property, wellfield or facility has a secure supply. For that you need site-level evidence: which aquifer is beneath it, how water levels there have trended, how much saturated thickness remains, who else pumps nearby, and what the local rules allow.

Lenders, developers, utilities and data center operators increasingly treat this as standard due diligence — the same way they treat environmental contamination. The data center groundwater due-diligence checklist lays out the steps.

Frequently asked questions

Is the United States running out of water?

Not nationally, but many regions face chronic stress. USGS estimates about 26.7 million people (8% of the conterminous U.S. population) live in areas with chronic supply–use imbalance, concentrated in the High Plains, Texas, the Southwest and California.

Which U.S. states have the worst water problems?

Chronic stress is greatest in parts of Texas, Arizona, California, New Mexico, Nevada, Kansas, Oklahoma and Colorado, and in irrigated areas of the Mississippi Embayment such as eastern Arkansas.

How many states expect water shortages?

In a 2014 Government Accountability Office survey, water managers in 40 of 50 states expected shortages in some part of their state within the next ten years under average conditions.

Do data centers make water scarcity worse?

They can at the local level. A large data center can use hundreds of thousands to millions of gallons a day for cooling, and many new facilities are being built in water-stressed regions. The impact depends on the cooling design and on whether the local aquifer or utility can sustain the added demand.

HOW ARGOS HELPS

Phreatic — groundwater availability

Site-level groundwater availability: aquifer-aware forecasts, drawdown, interference and sustainable yield.

Data Vault — environmental data

One home for water-level, chemistry and compliance data across a portfolio of sites.

SOURCES

Figures are taken from the primary sources above and dated as of the update shown. Concentrations are expressed in mg/L. Spot an error? Email support@argostellus.com.

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