Stellenbosch restricts household usage further Interactive tool tracks water targets

THE Stellenbosch municipality imposed stricter water restrictions yesterday‚ limiting home owners to using 6 000 litres a month.

The municipality – which governs the towns of Stellenbosch‚ Franschhoek and Pniel – receives two-thirds of its municipal water from Cape Town via the Wemmershoek and Theewaterskloof dams.

The new restrictions were imposed to bring the area in line with other municipalities that have already lowered consumption to 6 000 litres a month per household or 50 litres a person a day.

“As of the end of next month, the municipality will switch over to our own water sources‚ which will make us independent from Cape Town water sources,” the municipality said.

“By doing so, more water will be made available to the city’s residents.

“Our own water sources should be sufficient enough during this crisis but every resident should do their part in conserving water and sticking to the new water restrictions.”

The new restrictions in Stellenbosch ban the use of potable water for gardening or water features.

Borehole owners were urged to comply with a directive by the Department of Water and Sanitation to fit them with a device to monitor water consumption.

Stellenbosch is known for its wine farms‚ which have seen crop sizes diminish during the prolonged drought.

VinPro communications manager Wanda Augustyn said wine farmers were already off the municipal water system.

“The irrigation water they get is from dams on the farms,” she said.

The wine industry faces a challenging season ahead.

VinPro consultation service manager Francois Viljoen said: “Virtually no rain fell during the [December] period and many hot days were recorded.

“Together with a persistent southeasterly wind‚ this increased the water consumption of vineyards. This available water is simply not enough.

“Vineyards are now beginning to show symptoms of water shortage and declining berry growth.” AN interactive data visualisation tool using the latest available water consumption data has gone live to show where water is going in Cape Town, which has strict water restrictions in place.

The tool was launched yesterday by Eighty20‚ a company that works with and analyses data.

“Our aim for the Water Tracker is to provide a platform that educates people about the water crisis by providing access to data that has‚ to date‚ not been provided in a suburb-level view,” the company said yesterday.

“Our hope is that the Water Tracker ultimately makes people more aware about the crisis and nudges their behaviour towards greater water savings.”

The tracker uses median data of household water usage from December and compares it against this year’s December target of 10.5 kilolitres per household (assuming four people per household at 87.5 litres a day).

The tracker will be updated as new data becomes available.

“The visualisation revealed that high-income areas with larger estates‚ such as Bishopscourt‚ Clifton‚ Camps Bay and Fresnaye, tended to use more water and were exceeding targets‚ despite having decreased their water usage dramatically from the beginning of last year‚” Eighty20 said.

“Conversely‚ lower income areas along the N1 near the airport tended to have high water usage‚ including Gugulethu.

“However, as data only includes free-standing houses‚ it doesn’t correctly account for usage in informal housing.” –