Sierra Club questions water supply for Esencia, the Cabo Rojo resort in line for $497.7 million in tax credits
The director of Sierra Club Puerto Rico told a New York City Council committee at a public hearing on Monday, September 28, 2026 that the water supply for Proyecto Esencia, a tourism and residential development planned in Boquerón, Cabo Rojo, remains unresolved while the project is considered for about $500 million in tax credits, elvocero.com reported on September 29.
What the group told the council
The director testified before the Committee on Cultural Affairs and International Intergroup Relations, which considered four resolutions related to Puerto Rico, according to the outlet. One of them, Resolution 494, expresses solidarity with the people and organizations seeking to stop Esencia; the group asked that it advance to the full council.
The Puerto Rico Tourism Company has confirmed an estimated tax credit of $497,691,636.80 for the project, spread across six phases, the director said, adding that the agency's conditional recommendation does not certify that there is enough water for it.
On water, the group cited the Aqueduct and Sewer Authority as saying that the Betances filtration plant, which supplies Cabo Rojo, lacks the capacity for the project's estimated demand of about 1.25 million gallons a day. The group also raised public access to the coast, the possible displacement of residents and the effects of climate change, among them more heat, drier conditions, coastal flooding and saltwater intrusion into freshwater sources, and recalled the community campaign that led to the protection of the Northeast Ecological Corridor from tourism development, the outlet reported.
The project on file
In permit records analysed by RED Atlas, Esencia is filed by Cabo Rojo Land Acquisition, LLC as a tourism-residential development of 81 properties with a total area of 1,549 cuerdas (6,088,514 m2), to be grouped and re-divided into 19 components. The filings describe hotel rooms, single-family and multi-family tourist residences, a school with student dormitories, two golf courses, medical, commercial and entertainment areas, town centers and four public vehicular accesses to the beach, with buildings and roads on less than 25% of the land and the rest as landscaped, golf and conservation areas.
The main file, case 2024-579429 at Carretera 103 Km 10.5, shows infrastructure recommendation requests, the step at which the water authority and other utilities answer, recorded as approved on May 23, 2024 and June 5, 2025 (case 2024-579429-SRI-317354); the records do not show the conditions attached. An environmental recommendation was approved on May 23, 2024, the proponent-agency request for an environmental impact statement on September 3, 2024, and an environmental impact statement entry and an archaeology and historic-conservation recommendation on December 23, 2025. A site consultation filed on November 7, 2025 is marked incomplete. A second site consultation for the tourism-residential development on a 382,602 m2 property at Carretera 3301 Km 0.8, filed on July 13, 2026 with 35,544 m2 of built area (case 2026-693109-CUB-013470), is recorded as approved.
The land
The Carretera 103 property spans 1,781,207 m2 (178 hectares) and is classified as rustic land, 92% common and 8% specially protected. A $43.5 million bearer mortgage was recorded on it on August 26, 2022, with the applicant as mortgagor, according to RED Atlas property records.
The applicant has at least 63 purchase deeds of $100,000 or more recorded in its name in Cabo Rojo between March 29, 2022 and August 19, 2025, 24 of them at $1 million or more. The largest are $7.2 million for Lot 19 in Boquerón on September 13, 2024, $5.75 million for a property at Carretera 3301 Km 1.9 in Sector Combate on October 26, 2022, and three deeds of $5 million each: Lot 76 on October 16, 2024, Lot 78 on March 24, 2023 and another property at Carretera 3301 Km 1.9 on May 26, 2023.
Tourism property around the site
Cabo Rojo had 1,257 active short-term rentals on October 21, 2026, offered by 742 hosts at a median of $187 a night, according to RED Atlas. Of those, 634 are in Boquerón, and 200 lie within 3 km of the Esencia property, at a median of $209 a night.
Six hospitality properties were for sale in the town on the same date. The largest ask is $3.6 million for a 1,394 m2 property on 14,973 m2 of land at PR-307 Km 7.4 in Boquerón, about $2,583 per built square meter. Hacienda Tres Casitas in Monte Grande asks $2.4 million, Bohemian Casona on Carretera 102 Km 16.9 in Miradero $1.39 million, a property in Combate $1.2 million, Villa Patria in Monte Grande $900,000, and a renovated boutique hotel on Carretera Boquerón in Pedernales, listed on October 5, 2026, $549,000. The former Joyuda Plaza Hotel, 2,954 m2, was listed at $1.54 million in November 2025 and came off the market within two weeks.
