Since 1988, Georgia farmers who pump water from streams flowing through or by their farms or groundwater under their property have been required to get permits from the Georgia Environmental Protection Division (EPD). Permits are needed if the amount they use exceeds 100,000 gallons per day, on average, over a monthly period. Unlike municipal and industrial permits that EPD combines into one permit for the whole city, supplier or industry, farmers must have separate permits for each of their wells and each of the locations along streams where they withdraw water. On the other hand, farmers have been exempt from reporting water use amounts, while municipal and industrial users must report their combined withdrawals for each month.

EPD permits specify withdrawal rates (gallons per minute) that farmers can pump and total land area that farmers can irrigate. These are based on the amounts requested by the farmers on their application, and, until recently, they were not verified by EPD visits to the field. While the permits' acreage and withdrawal rates may not equal the farmers' current irrigated acreage or withdrawal rate, they do represent EPD's commitment of Georgia's water resources for these agricultural uses.

Permitted Systems by Source
Permitted Irrigated Acres
Percentage of Irrigated Acres in the sub-basins
Total Permitted GPM for Surface and Well Withdrawals
Permit Information Spreadsheet (Microsoft Excel - 5.1 MB)