Since the beginning of 2017, the region around the city of Cape Town, i.e. the Western Cape, is in the grip of the worst water crisis in over 110 years, according to reports. As there has been no relief through the long awaited rainy season during the last winter months, the city's government has announced level four water restriction measures as the consequence of the imminent drought crisis (see chart below).
In the last three years, there had always been the talk of a lack of rain in the Western Cape. Especially while exploring the countryside during the past trips down here, I came across the threat of too little water, for the residents as well as for the local wildlife, as a constant topic of discussion and concern.
The Western Cape's water supply comes from an interlinked system of six dams, with the main dams (Theewaterskloof, Wemmershoek, Voëlvlei, Bergriver and Steenbras Dam) located east of Cape Town, in the Cape Fold Mountains. The city of Cape Town is the largest water user of this system, however, it shares the supply with Stellenbosch, Paarl and other smaller municipalities. Which basically means that an "unconstrained increase in demand" coming from whichever of those cities would have a devastating effect on the water availability for the others along with the agriculture in that area (Cameron, R., 2017, Cape Town's Water Crisis: Towards a more water secure future).
Such an unconstrained increase can of course be due to many variables. However, what immediately came to mind was an increase of demand coming from an increase of tourist numbers in the Western Cape and especially in Cape Town in the following months, as the summer season is just about to begin. Therefore, I was also asking myself, whether it would be ethically justifiable to travel down here. If there is anything that a city threatened by a water crisis does not need more of, it is another privileged visitor with western living standards...
...now, I am not going to try and justify my decision to come back to what is like a second home to me, neither am I going to judge the thousands of tourists who are currently enjoying their life down here. And the only justifiable, objective reason I can give you for that, is that the tourism sector and the consequential service sector are both a large part of this country's GDP and therefore more important than some of us would like to admit. Nonetheless, if I was going to spend time here I knew that I wanted to have as little of an adverse impact and not put any more strain on the local water resources than absolutely necessary.
As an orientation aid the government published a chart on how to – according to some friends of mine "survive and thrive" – on only 87 litres per day! While that may sound like a lot, it might astound you that by flushing your toilet you are already "wasting" 9 to 10 litres on average of perfectly drinkable water! So all of a sudden, 87 litres do not seem that much anymore and the saying "if it's yellow, let it mellow" becomes your new, yet a little hard to get used to, best friend! ;-) The following bullet points are just some of the examples we have implemented in our home in order to save and reuse water (I was actually going to upload photos, but the internet has been too slow in the last couple of days.. oh well, TIA!).
Plastic tubs in all showers, to catch the water runoff (can be used to flush toilet or to water plants)
Plastic tubs in the kitchen sinks, to collect grey-water to water plants (the food scrap infused water is an amazing fertiliser of its own, believe me, your plants will thank you :-) !)
2litre water containers next to your bathroom sink, filled up with tap water every day to use for brushing teeth/ washing hands
Only shower with the lowest pressure possible
Biodegradable soap/shampoo so garden& plants can be watered without any concern
Just like most of you I have also found myself feeling a little puzzled as soon as the water shortage crisis hit - to me - home, and a city which has been known to be one of the most westernised and thriving examples on the African continent. Most of us live with the assumption that there will always be a reliable supply of accessible freshwater around. As soon as this holds no longer true, shock sets in and questions arise. Is it because of a badly thought out supply system in general? Has the demand increased so rapidly? Were there too many droughts and too little rain? Maybe it's climate change? Could this have been avoided? Will there ever be enough water in the dams again?
Before looking more closely at these questions, I think it is very important not to start finger-pointing in any direction. Yes, the government was estimating for the region to have troubles with its water supply in the future, but their calculations were set for 2019 earliest (does this make you feel any better about the situation?- nope, me neither, cause that means it was somewhat inevitable). But while the government had sounded a note of warning before, I also have to admit that probably most of us were not taking the issue seriously enough. Now, with Theewaterskloof and Voëlvlei Dam basically being dried up, it's too late to start arguments on who's really responsible and time to start acting.
While why the calculations of the Western Cape's government arrived two years earlier than expected can be easily explained with the global El Niño climate phenomena and the resulting lack of rain in the winter months during the past three years (click here to read more about El Niño), it still seems a little ironic that a city situated between two oceans has now run out of water. Surely, desalination should've been considered at an earlier point in time. If the government were to introduce this measure in order to separate possible drinking water from the seawater the earliest these plants would be up and running would be in two to three years. Therefore this method only is a long term solution in a time where short term relief is desperately needed.
More than the short term issue however, is the fact that the desalination process leaves behind a thick outflow of very salty water, mixed with chemicals, also known as "brine". This fluid, if you can call it that, is extremely hazardous to ecosystems, especially to marine life, and can therefore not be dumped back into the oceans, nor get in touch to ground water at any cost. Ultimate disposal of brine will thus become an issue for the Western Cape in the future.
However, new technologies are developing fast. Such as Reverse Osmosis, which involves more efficient membrane filtering and is therefore less dependent on dangerous chemicals. It has to mentioned on this point though, that the whole of the Middle East is basically running on desalination only, particularly the gulf states. In fact, with currently a global number of 13,000 of these plants, it is expected that by 2050, the number of desalination plans will have more than doubled. (Click here to read more about reverse osmosis and water supply challenges).
These are some of the actions the government will most likely be taking in the near future. The general public is left with water supply cuts, strict rules on tap water use and lower water pressure, as we are hopefully all trying to implement the government's advice on how to live on 87litres a day. What's more concerning at the moment however, is how not only the government (to get some short-term shortage relief) along with some of the more privileged citizens are trying to get permits for setting up boreholes on their property, in order to supply themselves with ground water. It is somewhat trivial to explain how excessively extracting ground water is madness, as in the long term it will lead to whole areas turning into barren deserts by robbing the local flora and fauna its livelihood, thus destroying whole ecosystems and the local microclimate...
I hope by now you got a feeling for the holistic nature of the problem and the need for innovative ideas. I could surely go on about the problems that come with a water crisis, think of water migrants and diseases born out of poor sanitation! But like I said, it's time for action. So maybe reading this post has made you aware of the immense privilege it is to have access to drinking water 24/7, like so many of us do. I know I have never paid it much of a thought when showering or doing the dishes or filling my glass wish fresh and drinkable tap water at home. Crazy, how dependent we really are on the water coming out of our pipes and how helpless we get as soon as this is no longer a given. Maybe you will be more cautious with using water in future, be it while showering, using the loo, doing your dishes and so on. Maybe even shower with your special someone more often ;-) Either way, never take water for granted!
As I am finishing off this post there are finally some dark clouds emerging on the horizon. Hopefully these clouds are carrying tons of water and are ready to burst right over the Cape of Good Hope, instead of being another drop in one of these two mighty oceans around us.
Please be advised that while I have been researching through local newspapers and scientific articles, I also talked to several locals and am writing while drawing on personal experiences. Therefore, all the information given in this post is only a snapshot of what is really happening here and a subjective impression of how I have been experiencing the situation. If you want to read more about this issue, I can gladly forward you my reading materials :-)