The City of Cape Town is under attack for its slow response time in facing the dire water shortage, particularly in respect of augmenting the low level of dam water with additional water sources, such as desalination. Now the Mayor of Cape Town, Patricia de Lille, has announced which desalination plants are to become operational, and how much water they will generate.
STATEMENT BY THE CITY’S EXECUTIVE MAYOR, PATRICIA DE LILLE
Mayor De Lille visits desalination plant site at V&A Waterfront
Today I visited the site of one of the City of Cape Town’s modular land-based desalination plants. The plant will produce 2 million litres of water per day and this water will be fed into the City’s water distribution network by February 2018.
Last week I made a commitment to communicate directly with all Capetonians about the City’s work to secure alternative water sources.
My message is clear: we have a plan, we will supply water but Capetonians, your help is vital and so we need you to keep saving.
I want to thank and commend Capetonians for their great efforts and for being partners on this journey by saving water.
We managed to bring consumption down to 585 million litres of collective use per day from pre-restriction consumption levels of 1,1 billion litres per day.
We will not allow a well-run city to run out of water.
The City is securing our water resilience through saving and bringing more alternative water sources into our network.
One such water source is the temporary desalination plant the City is building on East Pier Road in the V&A Waterfront.
An open-air parking lot opposite the heliports will be converted into a desalination plant that will produce 2 million litres of water every day.
The V&A Waterfront made the land available to the City at no cost. This is a good example how government and business can work together to ensure our water resilience.
Water will be abstracted from the ocean on the harbour side of the pier, treated at the desalination plant and treated clean water will be pumped into the City’s water network near the site.
The location of the site makes it easy for the City to provide services to the desalination plant. The City will provide electricity in November 2017 and construction will start soon after.
The desalination plant is in addition to the eight other modular land-based desalination plants the City is implementing.
These are for the following sites:
• Hout Bay – to produce 4 million litres per day
• Granger Bay – to produce 8 million litres of water per day
• Red Hill/Dido Valley – to produce 2 million litres of water per day
• Strandfontein – to produce 7 million litres per day
• Monwabisi – to produce 7 million litres per day
• Harmony Park – to produce 8 million litres per day
• Cape Town Harbour – to produce 50 million litres per day
• The universal sites – to produce 20 million litres per day
On Friday the City awarded the tenders to the desalination plants at Strandfontein and Monwabisi.
The City is also working groundwater abstraction at Atlantis and Silwerstroom, Cape Flats Aquifer, Cape Peninsula and Hottentots-Holland aquifers.
The City has already managed to increase the production capacity of the existing Atlantis and Silwerstroom aquifer by 5 million litres per day. This will increase incrementally to 25 million litres per day.
At the Zandvliet Wastewater Treatment Works, the pipeline work has already started and the yield will rise incrementally from this source to produce 10 million litres per day.
I am continually assessing the City’s solutions to provide alternative water sources while Capetonians continue to save.
We are not only building water resilience in the immediate future, but also looking ahead to the years to come and how we ensure water security beyond 2018’.
Chris von Ulmenstein, WhaleTales Blog: www.chrisvonulmenstein.com/blog Tel +27 082 55 11 323 Twitter:@Ulmenstein Facebook: Chris von Ulmenstein Instagram: @Chris_Ulmenstein
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Dear Mrs de Lille,
Thank you for addressing the water shortage problem decisively. However, I feel I need to point out something with relation to the water abstraction facility at Atlantis to you.
The farm Buffelsriver, which houses the water abstraction plant for Atlantis was owned by my grandfather and subsequently by my uncle. When the then government started expropriation proceedings to start the proposed colouredstan of Atlantis, our family employed the engineering firm Ninham Shand to test the strength of the water outflow into the sea in March/April 1975. They found that there was (If I remember Correctly) 3million gallons (13.6m Liters)overflow from the aquifer per day.
If therefore we assume that the outflow is surplus to the inflow, we can assume that if the city of Cape Town extracts only 13.6m litres daily, they will equal the inflow and therefore will not deplete the aquifer. The City’s proposed abstraction of 25m liters will obviously more than double the replenishment rate, and in this drought ridden time when replenishment is sketchy at best, this is certainly not going to be sustainable for long.
Might I remind you that the Buffels River overflow had stopped running by 1982, and that even in those normal rainfall times, the abstraction rate was therefore already higher than the inflow. We are grateful that the City reduced its abstraction rate, and the river started flowing again later on, but it was still enough to seriously affect the local flora. We can clearly see the effect of this on the fire-damaged section of veld near the purification plant where the Atlantis bypass road meets the West Coast road. The veld has not been able to rehabilitate itself, and we have had 2 winters, admittedly dry ones, since that fire. Fire damaged veld in other areas nearby has successfully rehabilitated, so the problem is solely caused by the drying out of the subsurface water by over abstraction of water from the aquifer.
Whilst I fully understand that Cape Town is in an emergency position right now, water abstraction from aquifers is clearly not sustainable under any circumstances. The city needs to take a longer term view of water supply which does not include abstraction of water from any aquifers. Might I remind you that the dry veld has now become a fire hazard, and the city has no water reserves to prevent it spreading to neighboring farms should one start in the area!
I hope this brings some factual basis for any future decision making. I am very concerned that the future tourism potential of the proposed greater west coast flora park extending from Koeberg to Langebaan is going to be seriously compromised unless the greater urban area rethinks its current position of over abstraction of water from the local aquifers.
Kind regards
John Duckitt
Waylands
Darling
0826587667