Puerto Rico Rations Water for 180,000 Customers

More than 180,000 customers in San Juan, Puerto Rico, and six nearby municipalities have been living under 48-hour rotating water shut-offs since Aug. 7, 2026, and officials expect the rationing to continue at least through August.

The official cause is drought. July was the driest month San Juan has recorded in more than 120 years, and the island's reservoirs are depleted.

But the system had almost no cushion to lose. In fiscal year 2024, the Puerto Rico Aqueduct and Sewer Authority, known as PRASA, lost 267 million of the 513 million gallons it produced each day — close to half — to leaks before the water reached a single customer, according to figures from Puerto Rico's federally appointed Financial Oversight and Management Board, which certifies the utility's budget.

The Numbers

The Superaqueduct, the large aging pipe system that carries water to the metro area, ruptured in June, sharply cutting supply to San Juan.

Two systems are failing at once: big transmission mains like the Superaqueduct, where one break can cut off a whole city, and roughly 15,000 miles of distribution lines that leak continuously.

PRASA's fiscal plan funds leak detection, but shows only a 6% reduction in water losses since 2019.

The leaks have been estimated to cost nearly $100 million a year in wasted water production and more than $200 million a year in lost revenue.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has put Puerto Rico's need for distribution and transmission pipe work at $2.2 billion — far more than the utility receives in funding or collects from customers.

The utility takes in about $1.1 billion a year against roughly $1.3 billion in operating costs, plus $240 million to $270 million a year in debt service on about $3.8 billion in long-term debt. That is why its capital program is mostly federally funded.