Corpus Christi, Texas, US – “It’s a beautiful bay, and it was even more beautiful in the beginning,” says 72-year-old Encarnacion “Chon” Serna, a retired chemical engineer, as he describes Corpus Christi Bay, which lies just a few feet from his doorstep in Portland, Corpus Christi in Texas. It’s the home in which Serna and his wife raised their four children and where their 10 grandchildren often visit to play in the waters that can be heard hitting the shore from their house.
Now, as the oil, gas and petrochemical industries threaten to take what’s left of the Gulf Coast along with Serna’s backyard – petrochemical facilities are currently being built in Ingleside, not far from his home – and as large-scale desalination projects, which will service these industries, gain approval to discharge wastewater back into the bay, he wonders how much longer it will survive.
