Rockdale County, GA Water Use Rules: Recycled Water Rules (2026)

Section 98-46, in chapter 98's water-system division, governs nonpotable water systems in unincorporated Rockdale County. Reclaimed water from a reclaimed wastewater treatment facility permitted by the Georgia Environmental Protection Division may supply water closets, urinals, trap primers for floor drains and floor sinks, water features, and other uses the authority having jurisdiction approves, but only in motels, hotels, apartment and condominium buildings, and commercial, industrial or institutional buildings where the individual guest or occupant has no access to plumbing of their own. § 1-3-3 defines them; it may never be approved to irrigate ground cover, trees, shrubs or other ordinary landscape plants.

That new-system irrigation limit does not reach backward, however, since the code exempts reclaimed water sourced from existing private reclaimed water systems, and exempts any reclaimed wastewater treatment system, existing or new, that is governmentally owned. The provision was adopted as part of the county's 2024 water-efficiency package, Ord. No. O-2024-36, Part I, effective December 10, 2024, alongside companion sections on faucet and showerhead flow rates, cooling tower efficiency, and landscape irrigation design standards found earlier in the same chapter.