Durban residents urged to save water

WHAT would you do if Durban began counting down to a Day Zero, like Cape Town?

For some ETHEKWINI residents, investing in a JOJO water storage tank and taking shorter showers are on the cards, while others say they would continue practising their water-wise habits.

However, whether residents would be able to survive on 50 litres per day remains to be seen.

“The city has always made a serious effort to curb water waste. The average consumption of ETHEKWINI Municipality for 2017 was 231 litres per person per day. This is a reduction of approximately 10%, which is 5% short of that required by the Department of Water and Sanitation in this time of drought,” said municipal spokeswoman Tozi Mthethwa.

This figure, however, includes water from burst pipes, leaking pipes, business usage, industrial usage, communal taps and toilet blocks.

The city had imposed water restrictions from March 2015, Mthethwa said.

“We installed restrictors, shut down water supply to allow reservoirs to fill up and educated the public about water conservation,” Mthethwa said.

Residents are still urged not to wash their cars with a hosepipe, or refill swimming pools, paddling pools or ponds with potable water.

Residents said they had taken a lesson from Cape Town, and were changing some of their habits.

Sagaren Maistry said he would get a JoJo tank.

Another resident, Laila Cassim, said: “It’s time we started listening and conserving.”

About 448 747 water restrictors had been fitted in homes across the city and only areas with a high water usage were targeted, Mthethwa said. If the area had shown a considerable improvement in the use of water, the restrictors would then be removed.

The city’s water task team convicted 20 properties for illegal water charges between July and December last year.

“Because of the court’s requirements being stringent as to who gets charged, it is not always successful in prosecuting perpetrators as normally they refuse to give their personal details, eg identity numbers, full names, etc. This is prevalent in the cases of tenants,” Mthethwa said.

The city was investigating groundwater mapping and rainwater harvesting, to avoid a Day Zero.

Water expert Dr Anthony Turton said he did not see a future for coastal cities, like Durban, with no desalination plants being built.

“Even though it appears that residents live in a subtropical environment, water is still scarce,” he said.