About Us
VMUD#2 is a tax-exempt entity, created by order of the Texas Commission of Environmental Quality(March 15, 1972), in accordance with the Texas Water Code Ch.54 as amended. The District provides water & sewer services to approximately 4,217 acres of land that includes the Town of Rancho Viejo, TX and the River Bend Resorts. The District also furnishes irrigation water to land areas within and outside the District’s boundaries. As a conservation and reclamation District, it is empowered to purchase, construct, operate and maintain all works, improvements, facilities, any plants necessary for the supply and distribution of water, the collection, transportation, and treatment of wastewater, and the control and diversion of storm water.
Water Facilities
VMUD has two sources of raw water supply: surface water and ground water. It currently owns 798 acre-feet of municipal surface water rights from the Rio Grande and source-equivalent 112 acre-feet from an existing well, bringing its total to 910 acre-feet. VMUD also owns a state water permit authorizing it to take 6,031 acre-feet per year from the Rio Grande.
VMUD currently operates and maintains two water treatment plants in Rancho Viejo. One is a conventional surface water treatment plant with a current capacity of 1.0 mgd. The other is a recently constructed Reverse Osmosis Water Treatment Plant with a capacity of 0.25 mgd. The RO plant treats groundwater from a well recently constructed at the site of the surface water plant. The existing total treated water capacity of 1.25 mgd. VMUD also owns a 2.51% interest in Southmost Regional Water Authority.
Valley MUD #2 Surface Water Treatment Plant
The District owns and operates a conventional surface water treatment plant located in Rancho Viejo, which treats water pumped from the Rio Grande River via a 6 mile canal to a storage reservoir prior to treatment. The surface water treatment plant is currently designed to treat 1.0 mgd. The District currently uses approximately 400,000 gpd of surface water.
Valley Municipal Utility District No. 2 Desalination (Reverse Osmosis) Plant
Valley Municipal Utility District No. 2 made a large step in securing its future water supply by utilizing brackish water wells. The district, which provides water service to Rancho Viejo and River Bend Resorts, completed the valley’s first municipal reverse osmosis treatment plant in 1999. This 250,000-gallon per day facility provides bottle quality water to its customers while preserving their water supply.
The project was completed utilizing NRS to provide the pilot testing, permitting, design, and construction management. By utilizing the construction management procedure, the district realized over 30 percent savings over conventional construction procedures.
Southmost Regional Water Authority (SRWA) regional desalination plant
The Southmost Regional Water Authority (SRWA) regional desalination plant, the largest such facility in Texas, is conserving precious surface water resources in the Lower Rio Grande Valley while ensuring participating communities of reliable, high-quality water for municipal and
industrial use. The plant uses state-of-the-art RO (RO) technology to treat previously untapped and unusable brackish groundwater resources as an alternative water supply. At start-up, the plant is providing 7.5 million gallons per day (mgd) of high quality water, more than 40 percent of the annual needs of participating entities, thus reducing dependency on the over-allocated Rio Grande. Project components have been over-sized for cost effective expansion in the future.
Raw Water Facilities
Water is diverted from the District’s pumping station located on the United States side of the Rio Grande located at River Bend Resort, Texas. After pumping from the river, the water is transported to Resaca del Rancho Viejo via a 42" pipeline. Water used to be transported by a main canal. The old main canal was an earthen canal approximately 29,700 feet in length. Resaca del Rancho Viejo serves as a storage reservoir and provides the raw water supply for the existing Rancho Viejo Surface Water Treatment Plant. The water plant serves the community of Rancho Viejo and River Bend Resort. The District diverts 90% of the water used in the system from the Rio Grande. All of this water diverted by the District from the Rio Grande originates as surface water that is released by the International Boundary and Water Commission (IBWC) from Falcon Reservoir. The other 10% comes from groundwater for municipal uses (equivalent to 112 Acre-ft of raw groundwater source treated by a Reverse Osmosis Water Treatment Plant). The District’s water delivery efficiency for water diverted for irrigation is approximately 75%.
The surface area of the old canal and the Resaca are of approximately 125 acres. The net evaporation in the Rio Grande Valley is approximately 5 feet per year. The old canal operation loses were approximately 570 acre-feet of water a year by evaporation, seepage, and “canal charging”. The District’s old main canal was constructed in the 1930’s. The District replaced the old canal with a 42” pipeline to improve operational efficiencies not only in terms of annual operation and maintenance expenditures, but also with respect to energy and water conservation.
Waste Water Treatment Plants
Valley MUD #2 and River Bend Wastewater Treatment Plants
The District’s wastewater treatment capacity is provided by the District’s two wastewater treatment plants. The Rancho Viejo development is served by a wastewater treatment plant with a permitted capacity of 400,000 gpd. The River Bend Resort development is served by a wastewater treatment plant with a permitted capacity of 46,000 gpd. Both plants have zero discharge permits with all treated effluent being used for golf course irrigation purposes. The wastewater treatment facilities have the capacity to serve approximately 2,500 equivalent single family connections. The District is currently servicing approximately 1,472 equivalent single family connections.