Users and Uses

The Upper White River Watershed provides water to thousands of area businesses, not to mention its ground water, streams, and reservoirs supply drinking water to all of central Indiana residents.  Some of the major water users in our watershed include: Citizens Thermal Energy, Eli Lilly, IMI McCordsville, Indiana-American Water Company , Indianapolis Department of Waterworks, Indianapolis Power & Light Company, Martin Marietta Materials, Inc, and Stony Creek Stone Company.

Each of these industries withdraws more than 1 billion gallons of water annually from water resources within the Upper White River Basin.  The Indianapolis Department of Waterworks in cooperation with Veolia Water serves nearly one million people in central Indiana. Various manufacturing operations are generally their largest customers.  Demands for water from range of 120 million gallons per day (MGD) during the winter, to a high of 228 MGD in the summer.  The average daily demand from Indianapolis Water customers is 140 MGD.  (This is more than the water in 212 Olympic sized swimming pools every day).