Agriculture is a big business in the United States, and a lot of water is used to produce our food. In 1995, farmers used water to irrigate about 59,250,000 acres of land. That is about 92,600 square miles, which you can think of as a big, square plot of land about 304 miles on a side. As expected, California led the Nation in acres irrigated, about 9,500,000, which was over 16 percent of the national total. Nebraska was next, irrigating about 7,450,000 acres, followed by Texas at about 6,310,000 acres.
Agricultural irrigation is much more prevalent in the arid Western United States than in the East.
The Western U.S. accounts for about 70 percent of irrigation water use. In 1995, about 49,000 million gallons per day were withdrawn from the ground for irrigation, whereas about 84,700 million gallons per day were taken from surface-water sources. It mainly is applied to golf courses and public areas, such as parks and road medians. Another 24.9 million acres were spray irrigated, with the remaining 1.7 million acres received drip irrigation. The United States produces a lot of electrical power, and water is important in that production.