SOUTH BAY, FL (Boca Post) (Copyright © 2025) — Governor Ron DeSantis joined state and regional officials in South Bay on Thursday to break ground on a massive new inflow pump station at the Everglades Agricultural Area (EAA) Reservoir, a centerpiece of Florida’s push to restore natural water flow south from Lake Okeechobee into the Everglades.

Standing on a stretch of farmland south of the lake in South Bay, DeSantis called the project “another major step we are taking to restore the country’s most unique and prized ecosystem.” He said decades of flood-control projects diverted water east and west, leaving the Everglades and Florida Bay starved of fresh water. “Water had been redirected east and west through artificial canals,” he said. “It eventually produced harmful discharges in both the St. Lucie and Caloosahatchee estuaries and took fresh water from the Everglades that the ecosystem depends on.”

The new inflow pump station will rank among the largest in the state, equipped with nine pumps capable of moving about 3 billion gallons of water per day from Lake Okeechobee into the EAA Reservoir. When finished, the reservoir itself will hold roughly 78 billion gallons — an area larger than Manhattan — and is designed to deliver as much as 470 billion gallons of clean water each year to the Everglades and Florida Bay while helping recharge the Biscayne Aquifer, South Florida’s main source of drinking water.

DeSantis noted that the ceremony marked the 80th milestone event since 2019 for Everglades restoration projects, the most in Florida history. “We’ve shown just how effective that work is when done together,” he said, crediting cooperation among state, federal, and local partners. “This work has a return on investment, obviously in terms of quality of life, but also in terms of Florida’s economy.”

The EAA Reservoir Project is one of several efforts accelerated under an agreement signed earlier this year between Florida and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. That deal moved up the reservoir’s completion timeline by five years — from 2034 to 2029 — and cleared regulatory hurdles that had slowed progress.

Department of Environmental Protection Secretary Alexis Lambert praised the governor’s pace. “Restoring America’s Everglades is one of the most ambitious environmental restoration projects ever undertaken,” she said. “With every project we are delivering real results on time, under budget, and with strong returns for Florida’s taxpayers.”

Since taking office, DeSantis has made water quality and Everglades restoration a signature issue. On his second day in office in 2019, he issued Executive Order 19-12, pledging $2.5 billion over four years for water projects. The state ultimately invested $3.3 billion in his first term — more than the previous 12 years combined — and has already committed another $4.6 billion during his second term.

In western Palm Beach County on Thursday, the governor told the crowd that restoring the Everglades is not just an environmental goal but an economic one. “Places like the Everglades are one reason why people like to be tourists in Florida,” he said. “There’s a lot of great stuff to see for those who are of that type of bent.”

The EAA Reservoir and its new inflow pump station are expected to reduce harmful discharges to the St. Lucie and Caloosahatchee estuaries, restore ecosystems south of Lake Okeechobee, and increase South Florida’s water-storage capacity — now tripled to 176 billion gallons since 2019.

As the governor put it during his remarks, “Today is another major step in getting this done.”