Data solutions to water crisis

STUDENTS from the local Explore Data Science Academy (EDSA) have drilled deep into data investigating solutions to the city’s water crisis.

Despite Day Zero being off the cards this year, students at EDSA investigated supply and demands factors that have contributed to the crisis.

Using only publicly available data, the students proved the blame could not be attributed to any single cause, but that multiple factors in varying degrees each contributed to the water crunch.

The students, after two months of investigation, concluded that a combination of low rainfall, population growth, shifting consumption levels as well as evaporation, were all factors affecting the city’s critical dam levels.

The o-founder of EDSA, Aidan Helmbold, said data science was about taking real world problems and finding real world solutions.

“The water project required our interns to make use of various available data sets and technology to analyse the City’s water consumption, and to make these insights available so that the City could better understand the underlying dynamics.”

As part of the projects, students were required to analyse the main supply and demand factors affecting the water crisis. Demand factors were drawn from water consumption data available on the City of Cape Town’s Open Data portal while supply factors were to do with the impact of weather data: rainfall, temperature and windfall patterns on water evaporation.

“I think the most astounding aspect for us as education providers was to see how much 100 young minds can achieve with only three months of data science training behind them.“We were also amazed at how quickly the students were able to adapt to the softer skills, such as teamwork and the realities of managing multiple project deliverables,” said Helmbold. – Staff Reporter