ASCE report card: Texas’ water infrastructure downgraded
This week, the Texas Section of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) released its 2025 report card for Texas’ infrastructure. Different elements of Texas’ infrastructure portfolio, including roads, bridges, dams and ports, among others, were assigned a grade using the A through F scale.
Overall, Texas infrastructure earned a C, indicating mediocre quality that requires greater policy attention.
While ASCE’s new report card includes some bright spots — aviation received a B and bridges a B- — the new findings regarding Texas’ water infrastructure are particularly alarming. Texas’ drinking water infrastructure earned a D+, while our wastewater systems barely avoided failing with a D-. These new, not-good grades underscore the urgency for addressing our long-term water infrastructure challenges.
Here are a few takeaways from ASCE’s new report card for Texas:
1.) Texas’ water infrastructure grades actually got worse.
In the last ASCE report card issued in 2021, Texas’ drinking water and wastewater infrastructure earned a C- and a D, respectively. The new grades released this week are, in fact, downgrades. Drinking water infrastructure declined from a C- to a D+, as wastewater dropped from a near-failing D to a just-about-to-fail D-.
Moms and dads, and certainly state policymakers, shouldn’t be happy with these results.
ASCE’s full report provides greater insight into why these downgrades happened. A doubling in boil water notice advisories between 2019 and 2023 combined with an over twelvefold increase in the number of public water systems that have limited water use to avoid shortages contributed to the lowering of Texas’ drinking water grade to a D+. An uptick in water quality violations between 2020 and 2024 and the continued deterioration of existing aging systems earned the state’s wastewater sector a D-.
2.) State dedicated funding made roads better.
While Texas’ water infrastructure grades declined in 2025, the grades for roads and highways improved. In 2021, the ASCE rated state roads and highways with a D+. This year, Texas’ highways improved to a C-. There’s a reason why this happened.
ASCE correctly attributes this improvement to the state’s financial strategy for funding transportation infrastructure. In 2014 and 2015, both the Legislature and state voters approved the dedication of state sales and severance tax revenues to the State Highway Fund. This reliable, consistent financial strategy has enabled transportation planners to expand roadway capacity to meet growing demands.
Legislators are currently considering applying the transportation funding model to Texas’ water infrastructure needs. To be sure, a constitutionally-dedicated revenue stream toward water infrastructure will set Texas on the path toward closing its long-term water infrastructure funding gap and, hopefully, improving the quality of drinking water and wastewater systems across the state.
3.) Texas must use data to track water infrastructure success (or lack thereof).
ASCE releases its national and state infrastructure report cards every four years. These valuable assessments enable the public and policymakers to track successes (e.g. Texas’ roads) and challenges (Texas’ water infrastructure) over time. This is also known as longitudinal data tracking.
If the Legislature pursues dedicated funding for water infrastructure this session, then this financial strategy should be accompanied with performance metrics that track success with regard to addressing our water challenges. These metrics would provide valuable longitudinal data on how well the state is expanding its water supply portfolio and fixing aging, deteriorating drinking water and wastewater systems. More critically, these data will describe the return on taxpayers’ investment in water infrastructure.