Residents can expect pressure to drop
RESIDENTS of Woodstock, Salt River and Delft were the first to experience lower water pressure in their pipes as part of the City’s preparations for Day Zero.
Farouk Robertson, spokesperson for the City of Cape Town’s water and sanitation management department, said its aim was to bring collective usage down to 450 million litres per day which required consumers use 50 litres per person per day.
The pressure management will be done in Brooklyn near Milnerton, with work scheduled for today from 8pm to 4am.
Work has already been done in Delft, Woodstock, Salt River and the Epping Industrial area.
Robertson said other areas would be informed of supply disruptions in due course.
“Affected areas are requested not to stockpile large volumes of municipal water as the service interruptions are not expected to be in effect for long periods,” he said.
Robertson said pressure management generally lowered consumption by reducing the rate at which water flows to properties.
“It also reduces the risk of leaks and pipe bursts by better ensuring that pressure remains within levels that reduce stress on the infrastructure. We are doing absolutely everything in our power to help Team Cape Town to avoid Day Zero.”
Peter Flower, the City’s director for water and sanitation, said: “We have identified at least 25 areas across the city that could benefit from this technology.
“Further implementation will be rolled out over the next few months and contractors have been brought in to speed up the programme.”
Flower said residents must keep all taps closed and store five to 10 litres of water for essential purposes during this time.
Meanwhile, Greenpeace Africa said it began a petition calling on President Jacob Zuma to declare the Eastern and Western Cape national disaster areas.
Within in 10 days, 2 769 citizens of South Africa and the international community sent an email containing the petition directly to the office of the Presidency, the organisation said.
At same time, Anton Bredell, MEC for Local Government, Environmental Affairs and Development Planning, said he noted the national government’s comments on the perceived slow spending of drought relief funding in the Western Cape.
“The comments are unfortunate and may lead to certain misperceptions. The province applied for a provincial disaster declaration in November 2015. This was approved by the National Government, 19 months later in May 2017,” he said.
By August 2017, the national government announced the funding to be strictly allocated for R40 million towards agriculture for livestock feed; R20m to the City of Cape Town to assist in drilling into the aquifers; and R14m for relief projects in only two other municipalities, Bitou and Theewaterskloof.
NEXT time you see a passenger boarding a plane with a five-litre bottle of water, don’t be a alarmed. It is just someone on their way to Cape Town. Domestic airlines are allowing passengers travelling to Cape Town to carry the water as hand luggage, as their contribution to the city’s water crisis.
FlySafair said it implemented the measure two weeks ago.
“What we recognise is that our customers, like all South Africans, are desperate to try to help in whatever way they can. People want to carry their own water when travelling to the city and feel they are limiting the burden on the city’s resources and we respect that.
“That said, we do want people to be informed about the environmental impact of carrying water by air, because
OUR CUSTOMERS, LIKE ALL SOUTH AFRICANS, WANT TO HELP IN WHATEVER WAY THEY CAN
transporting water this way is far more carbon intensive than transporting it by other means,” said Kirby Gordon, FlySafair sales and distribution head.
Gordon said the rules were: five litres of water per person over and above the 7kg hand luggage restriction. The water must be stowed beneath the seat in front of the passenger and the offer was not available to those seated in emergency exits or bulkhead rows.
“We recommend purchasing square