City assures drinking water is ‘safe’

THE CITY of Cape Town said the “necessary adjustments” were being made to ensure drinking water was treated to acceptable standards as the quality depreciated due to plummeting dam levels.

The municipality caters to a population of more than 3.7 million.

Mayco member for water services Xanthea Limberg said one of the reasons the last 10% of a dam’s water could not be extracted was that the dam’s volume would be difficult to treat to acceptable standards.

Collective dam levels continued to drop and stood at just over 23% this week, rendering the Mother City with about 86 days of usable water left.

“Residents are assured that water undergoes extensive filtration, as well as chemical treatment before it is pressure-fed into the reticulation system.

“Water quality is controlled at the treatment plants by the process controllers, who perform tests on an hourly basis in the on-site labs in order to make the necessary adjustments.

“In addition, we comply with strict water quality checks, as prescribed by the national government’s Department of Water and Sanitation. This rigorous process means that water quality is closely monitored via a large number of water samples analysed according to the stringent South African National Standards requirements.”

She said in total more than 5 500 samples of water drawn from sampling points throughout the system were tested every year “to ensure the excellent quality of our water”. “In terms of these test results, water remains safe to drink.”

The municipality has cautioned that stricter water restrictions could be on the cards soon.

It had previously said water shedding would be a last resort and had asked consumers not to use municipal water for outside use.

Limberg said the city was expected to commence its emergency water schemes in June, in accordance with the disaster declaration, “and as a result of sound, proactive governance”.

“The exploratory phase of a pilot project for the extraction of water from the Table Mountain Group Aquifer (TMGA) is expected to begin near the end of June. At this stage, the foreseen yield is approximately two million litres per day. This is because we are taking a precautionary approach to determine the sustainable yield of the TMGA.” –

‘RESIDENTS ARE ASSURED THAT WATER UNDERGOES EXTENSIVE FILTRATION’