Governor Sonny Perdue submitted the request Friday.

State officials want an exemption from federal regulations requiring some water be reserved for endangered species. They've also asked a federal judge to make the Army Corps of Engineers curb the amount of water it's draining from Georgia reservoirs into streams in Alabama and Florida.

The White House says it's already started drafting interim rules to deal with the endangered species issue. And it says the Army Corps of Engineers has started revising the operations manual for a river basin in Georgia.

More than a-quarter of the Southeast is suffering from drought considered ``exceptional,'' which is the National Weater Service's most severe drought category. One major reservoir in Georgia is less than three months from being depleted. Small reservoirs are dropping even faster.

(Copyright 2007 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)