Operational challenges, system failures and demand outstripping supply have left frustrated businesses and residents in three Gauteng metros with little or no water supply in recent weeks.
Bulk water supplier Rand Water needs to urgently improve the reliability and backup arrangements for their critical operational centres, following water outages plaguing Gauteng’s metropolitan municipalities, water expert Mike Muller said last week.
Rand Water is crucial to the economy as it supplies the province’s metros of Johannesburg, Ekurhuleni and capital city Tshwane, local municipalities, mines and other industries, as well as parts of Mpumalanga, the North West and the Free State with an average of 3.653-million litres of potable water daily.
However, the water supplier has been beset by operational challenges that resulted in water outages in parts of SA’s economic hub. In July an explosion at Rand Water’s Palmiet booster pumping station in Alberton left the three metros without water.
Bulk water supplier Rand Water needs to urgently improve the reliability and backup arrangements for their critical operational centres, following water outages plaguing Gauteng’s metropolitan municipalities, Muller said.
Rand Water recently implemented water restrictions to the three metros, saying its distribution network is “under severe pressure as water consumption exceeds supply”. This resulted in low water levels in some of its critical reservoirs, and a power failure at the Zuikerbosch water treatment plant worsened the situation.
On Wednesday angry residents of South Hills in Johannesburg marched to Rand Water’s offices in Glenvista, demanding answers. Water outages in areas such as South Hills, Linmeyer, Tulisa Park, and Risana, among other areas, have resulted in schools shutting down. Rand Water said it was attending to the problem.
Mduduzi Shabangu, head of water & sanitation in Ekurhuleni metro, told Business Day on Friday that water cuts were experienced in the Germiston, Sunnyridge and Kempton Park areas for about three days, but said that supply of the resource has since improved.
“Yes, we had some challenges regarding water cuts, but the situation was not as bad as what’s happening in Tshwane and Johannesburg. Our water pressure is picking up.”
Tshwane MMC for water & sanitation Phillip Nel said in a statement that the municipality has developed a strategy to “reroute some of the water supply in Tshwane to support residents” in affected areas.
The metro’s engineers deployed a strategy “whereby we reduce water to low-lying levels in parts of the city in order to assist in augmenting the supply to the reservoirs to support residents in Laudium, Atteridgeville and Lotus Gardens”.
“It has now been a week since the pressure to these reservoirs collapsed as Rand Water has failed to ensure an adequate supply resulting in taps in these areas running dry. Despite continued assurances by Rand Water that they would restore pressure, both of the reservoirs remain critically low.”
Nel said this intervention requires constant monitoring of the reservoir levels across the city to ensure that “we maintain the correct balance in the system”.
Johannesburg Water MD Ntshavheni Mukwevho was not immediately available for comment.
Rand Water spokesperson Gregg Mulzack told TimesLIVE this week that the utility experienced “a very sharp increase in water usage in recent weeks, where demand was exceeding supply”.
Mulzack said high water use is something the utility experienced whenever temperatures started rising. “We can accept infrastructural issues may also result in a loss of water and increase the demand, things like burst water pipes,” he said.
Mulzack said Rand Water had exceeded its limit of what its licence permits it to take from the Vaal Dam: “Our abstraction licence permits us to abstract 1.347-million cubic metres of raw water from the Vaal Dam. At the moment, we are at 1.680-million cubic metres abstracted. That’s more than 330-million over what we are allowed to abstract.”
Muller, an engineer and development specialist, told Business Day: “Rand Water has previously experienced similar failures and the current situation suggests that they have not been adequately dealt with. The board must pay more attention to the reliability of its operations.”
Muller said Rand Water “must urgently improve the reliability and backup arrangements for their critical operational centres. Most of Gauteng’s citizens and many more in surrounding provinces depend on Rand Water for their water supplies.”
Rand Water’s failures, said Muller, “may be due, in part, to the fact that the organisation has been directed to address water problems that are not part of its normal mandate. These included intervening in sewage treatment failures in Emfuleni and challenges of rural water distribution.
“Rand Water should be instructed by [water and sanitation minister Senzo] Mchunu to focus on its primary task of providing safe and reliable bulk services to its users. It should only undertake additional activities if these do not distract management from their primary task,” he said.
“To avoid complete shutdowns, when Rand Water experiences production problems, it should immediately tell its municipal customers so that they can reduce consumption in an organised manner.”
Muller said until the phase of the Lesotho Highlands Water Project was completed in 2028, “Gauteng will be at increasing risk of water shortages in the event of a severe drought”.
“Our municipalities need to be working more actively to tell their citizens how much water is being used and whether we are managing to keep our consumption at safe levels,” he said.
Kgosientso Ramokgopa, the head of investment and infrastructure at the office of the presidency, said last November that the government will implement big-ticket infrastructure development projects worth R350bn across the water, energy, transportation and ICT sectors to create jobs and revive the economy in 2021.
He did not respond immediately to questions sent to him.
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