The real threat to water security

There are some questions which a gentleman is not permitted to pose to a lady.

In our house, querying the cost of water for her garden is one such taboo line of enquiry. And I say her garden for two reasons.

First, she is the one who puts the most effort into it (when we moved in almost 30 years ago, I was much more energetic).

Secondly, when discussing it with people she refers to it as hers. I don’t mind being a visitor, though…

These days, she tries to stick to the municipal water restrictions by getting up around 5am to water by hand – and is also out after the sun goes down at 6pm.

Joburg by-laws ban watering of garden between those times. Not that most people bother sticking to that regulation, though.

ALSO READ: Gauteng water crisis: No date for Day Zero but it will be a summer of outages

Even if we weren’t faced with an incipient water crisis across Gauteng, the 6pm to 6am watering rule still makes sense.

Outside of those hours, your expensive municipal water is going to evaporate in the harsh sun.

The alternative, of course, is a borehole – but they’re not cheap.

A few houses in our area have sunk them in the past six months, so I guess expensive is relative.

On top of the hole itself, you have to pay for electricity to run it – either mains or via a solar setup, neither of which are for penny-pinchers.

Stories about the water shortages made me think about our consumption.

While the garden and the pool are top consumers, we otherwise don’t waste water.

I can shower effectively in less than a minute and seldom take a wasteful bath.

My car looks as though it has returned from an expedition to the Namib, because it is so caked in dust.

Because you are not allowed to use hosepipes to wash cars under the level 1 restrictions, I have been putting off the day I wash it by bucket.

ALSO READ: Gauteng water crisis: ‘The crisis we sought to prevent has now materialised’

The alternative – to go to a car wash – wastes even more water.

And it is those hundreds of car washes – along with hundreds of burst water pipes which never seem to get repaired – rather than northern suburbs madams like my wife – which are part of a bigger threat to our water security.

In the big drought of 1994 – before the Lesotho Highlands Water Scheme kicked in to supplement the Vaal River system – I remember standing on the wall of the Vaal Dam, looking at what was a puddle, rather than a massive lake.

The then water minister Kader Asmal was warning that water – the lack of it – was a bigger threat to SA than crime…

Maybe we need to consider a life without green lawns and flowers. Somebody please tell my wife that – I wouldn’t dare.