The Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality may make use of water-flow restrictors soon for users who continue to use water excessively.
These were the words of Nelson Mandela Bay Mayor, Nqaba Bhanga, during a recent media briefing regarding the crippling drought.
Although Bhanga said, during a press briefing last month, that restrictors would be installed at homes of high water users across the metro, the roll-out was soon suspended, as the municipality decided to focus more on communicating with residents and educating them first, before opting for more drastic measures.
However, Bhanga emphasised that while the installation of water-flow restrictors had been suspended for now, they could very soon be implemented for residents who don’t reduce their water use.
“The metro is over-extracting our allocated water allowance and using about 300 million litres per day. We need to reduce our consumption to below 250 million litres per day to extend the amount of time that there is water available from our dams, while we wait for rains and our augmentation projects to come online,” Bhanga said.
“Every single one of us should be taking active measures to save water in our daily lives.”
He mentioned that the metro would soon launch a comprehensive communication plan, where they would expand on the metro’s alternative interventions and contingency plans, as the drought situation entered the next phase.
According to Bhanga, a final decision on the installation of restrictors would be made following this plan.
“I will also make an announcement [this week] to show in detail the extent of the water crisis we are in,” Bhanga added.
Meanwhile, the municipality has been working around the clock to implement measures to circumvent the prospect that the metro may run out of water.
This includes the construction of a R200 million Coegakop borehole Water Treatment Works facility that started last year and is at approximately 40% completion. Construction is scheduled to be completed by September 2022.
Upon completion, the treatment works will add 20 million litres of water per day into the metro’s water system.
Part of the work that has been done was to test the quality of the water and the effect of integrating it into the broader water infrastructure of the metro.
During a recent oversight visit to the facility, acting executive director of infrastructure and engineering, Joseph Tsatsire, said that they are happy about the tests they have done on quality and the technical aspects of integrating the water into the system.
“The construction is also proceeding well and the cement and steel works are almost done.
“We will soon start with the engineering and architectural aspects and are confident that by September next year, this project will be completed,” he said.
The exploration of alternative water sources forms part of the measures that the metro is currently implementing.
The Nooitgedacht Water Treatment Works phase three is also under construction, with expected completion later this year. The completion of this phase will guarantee the metro an additional 40 million litres per day compared to the current 170 million litres.
The metro also expects to get a total of 15 million litres from other bore-holes across the city.
Plans to develop a seawater desalination plant have already started, although still in the early stages of Council approval.
The desalination project will add about 15 million litres per day into the system. An aggressive water leaks programme is also underway, with close monitoring of turnaround time to respond, arrival on site and the fixing of leaks.
The municipality also has an additional capacity of seven plumbing contractors that augment the municipal plumbing staff.
MMC for Infrastructure and Engineering, Masixole Zinto, said that they had two focus areas: accelerating their efforts to improve infrastructure and explore alternative water sources and creating partnerships with residents and stakeholders to work with them to save as much water as possible.
“We want our message of saving water to make sense.
“We want our people to easily understand our call of saving water, not only because it is the right thing to do, but because they practically see our efforts of fixing leaks and improving infrastructure,” Zinto said.
