Pretoria - The growing challenges and scarcity of water in Gauteng municipalities has pushed the City of Tshwane to intensify its plans and engagement to increase its water generation capacity from 12.5% to 44% a day.
This was revealed by Executive Mayor Randall Williams and MMC for Utility Services and Regional Operations Daryl Johnston who visited the Rietvlei Water Treatment Plant that is one of the water treatment plants that could produce more water if the infrastructure is expanded.
In light of the water restrictions implemented and imposed upon the municipality by bulk water supplier Rand Water, Williams and Johnston said unlike other Gauteng municipalities, Tshwane had the potential to maximise its water production capacity.
Currently the City of Tshwane produces over 100 megalitres per day of its own potable water, and purchases around 700 megalitres per day from Rand Water. This means overall, the City produces around 12.5% of its own water per day.
Potentially the City can produce up to 44% of its own water by optimising current available resources such as the Rietvlei Water Treatment Plant. The plant can be expanded from 40 megalitres of water a day to 240 megalitres of water a day phased in by starting with a 100 megalitres of water a day extension, followed later by 2 x 50 megalitres of water a day extensions.
Williams said while the Rand Water situation may improve, the reality was that the City ought to expect water scarcity to be a growing problem in Gauteng moving forward. This meant that large municipalities need to have a plan in place to reduce our reliance on Rand Water.
“The good news here is that Tshwane has capacity to improve our water security. Furthermore our water management statistics show that the City of Tshwane has been using on average 100 megalitres less water per day than the same period last year. So the current water challenges by Rand Water have come despite the City of Tshwane using less water this year compared to last year.
“To demonstrate this, our average supply from Rand Water for the week ending October 18 was 811 megalitres per day. This year for the same period this has gone down to 704 megalitres per day. This means the City of Tshwane has actually seen a yearly water consumption reduction of over 10% and what this should demonstrate is that we have a Rand Water problem not a City of Tshwane water problem.”
Gauteng experienced its first major water shortage, due to supply challenges from Rand Water, originally due to poor pumping capacity due to high levels of rolling blackouts, with load shedding stages 4-6 causing significant problems for Rand Water’s pumping. This was then exacerbated by the very late start to the spring rains, which caused an increase in water usage after the winter quiet period.
This surge meant that even as load shedding decreases, water usage increased, causing Rand Water’s reservoir storage system to drop as low as 30%. Their system has now recovered with the rains lowering water usage and the City is expecting the Rand Water system to recover to 60%-80% by the end of the month which should allow for the easing of restrictions.
Moreover, the population of Gauteng has grown from 12 million to 16 million since 2011 but the supply of water has not increased significantly during this time. The Lesotho Highlands Water Project is expected to continue to be delayed for years, while there is insufficient maintenance of water infrastructure by Rand Water as well as by municipalities.
However, Johnston said the City had a good story to tell in this sphere and has the opportunity to use this current water situation to highlight the positive position it has to build support for the sustained campaign of action needed to resolve this issue.
He said the City produces over 100 megalitres per day of its own potable water but current facilities, if working correctly, could produce just less than 350 megalitres of water a day. Expansion projects will offer up to 400 megalitres of water a day.
The City's own water production is also cheaper than purchasing from Rand Water and can result in improved revenue collection.
The City conducted a feasibility study through a transactional advisor and found that this project is technically feasible and it can be implemented in Phases. The first phase will be the expansion of Rietvlei Water Treatment Plant, with return flows from the Olifantsfontein Waste Water Treat Plant, by 100 megalitres of water a day to a capacity of 140 megalitres of water a day at an estimated cost of R2 billion.
Second can be the Roodeplaat Water Treatment Plant that can be expanded from 80 megalitres of water a day to 140 megalitres of water a day.
However, analysis showed that the City does not have the financial capacity to implement this project using its own internal mechanism, but the City will be engaging provincial and national government and other funders.
Pretoria News