AT&T

AT&T is a U.S.-based telecommunications company headquartered in Dallas, Texas. Its business includes wireless service, fiber broadband, 5G networks, business connectivity, and communications infrastructure. AT&T uses water at network sites, offices, leased facilities, and equipment that require cooling; as a result, water use is a small part of its operational resource management.

AT&T's most notable water-related achievement is the reduction in estimated U.S. water consumption in 2025. The company consumed 9.27 million cubic meters, compared to 9.59 million cubic meters in 2024, representing a decrease of approximately 0.32 million cubic meters, or 3.3%. AT&T also indicates that most of its sites rely on municipal water, with less than 1% sourced from wells, reducing direct pressure on groundwater resources.

The company also monitors its U.S. water footprint, upgrades water-intensive cooling systems with more efficient cooling towers and components, and utilizes its Enterprise Building Management System to track chilled water requirements for cooling towers. This system also enables AT&T to assess equipment performance, enhance maintenance practices, and identify opportunities for energy reduction associated with cooling. In 2025, AT&T piloted ElectroCell technology in cooling towers to evaluate potential savings in maintenance, energy consumption, and water costs, with third-party engineers engaged to verify the results.

What distinguishes AT&T among U.S. carriers is its equipment-level experimentation: the ElectroCell pilot, third-party engineering verification, and building-management telemetry point to a technology-testing approach rather than a target-driven one. The limitation is that none of it is quantified — no site counts, no savings volumes, no supplier water reductions — so the disclosure documents method, not outcome.