The residents of Cape Town heeded the call to reduce their water consumption and Day Zero has moved to 13 May 2018. Here is your water update for this week.
Last month, Cape Town announced that if water consumption was not reduced to 500 million litres of collective usage per day or 87 litres each per day for every resident, the supply of municipal water would not be available by March 2018.
The City’s Executive Mayor, Patricia de Lille made an announcement that residents have reduced their water consumption dramatically and Day Zero has now moved to 13 May 2018.
She said in a statement: “The City is also doing its bit. As we bring additional supply online from February onwards with more new water coming online in the months thereafter, Day Zero will be pushed further.”
“We have already brought additional water from the Molteno Reservoir in Oranjezicht and the Atlantis Aquifer, with two million and five million litres per day from these sources respectively,” she added.
The City said that there are currently seven projects already under way in the first phase. These are Monwabisi, Strandfontein, the V&A Waterfront, and Cape Town Harbour desalination plants; the Atlantis and Cape Flats Aquifer projects; and the Zandvliet water recycling project that will be producing an additional 144 million litres per day between February and July, with the yield from these projects rising incrementally in the months thereafter.
Dam levels in Cape Town continue to drop and are sitting at 26% this week while the Western Cape is at 35%.
Here is your weekly dam update:
The Vaal River System consisting of 14 dams serving mainly Gauteng Sasol and Eskom is at 85%.
The Cape Town Dams System consisting of six dams serving mainly City of Cape Town this week are at 35% after some rainfall last week. Phase 1 of their Critical Water Shortages Disaster plan is in effect.
Here are the latest dam percentages throughout the country:
