Leaky infrastructure will carry on costing City of Joburg – experts

Gauteng’s water crisis is far from over, as experts say increasing the bulk water allocation in the province will come down to pouring more water into an already leaking and inadequate distribution system.

Johannesburg had water losses of more than 25% – worth R1.5 billion in 2020-21, according to the Joburg Water Integrated Annual Report.

As an emergency measure to address water shortages in Gauteng’s metros, districts and local municipalities, Water and Sanitation Minister Senzo Mchunu yesterday promised to increase the bulk water allocation to the Rand Water system.

“We note the increase in water usage and restrictions imposed by Rand Water in response to deteriorating water levels in their reservoirs,” he said.

“This should bring relief to some metros, namely Joburg, Tshwane and Mogale City district municipality. However the measure is for a period of nine months while we seek more permanent solutions to water usage and management.”

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Spokesperson for the department of water and sanitation Sputnik Ratau told water officials the minister had said municipalities “must go out of their way to … ensure leaks are repaired as a matter of urgency”.

“Otherwise we would be taking a cup of water and dropping it in the ocean.”

Consequences of poor maintenance

Dr Jo Barnes, former lecturer at the University of Stellenbosch’s Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences’ division of community health, said the City of Joburg should have prioritised leaks as it had been constantly “advised of the consequences of poor maintenance”.

“The more you pour in, the more [water] will be lost,” she said. “Over the years the efforts required to improve the system have been inadequate. Trying to talk one’s way out of a problem on the scale facing the City of Joburg is not an option any longer.”

Barnes said apart from the poorly functioning existing infrastructure, the city had also not been keeping pace with expansion of the population.

“The number of poorly serviced areas has been expanding, so this also adds to the pressure on the water provision services.

“The planning and financial management of water distribution systems need attention, too.”

Meanwhile the minister also said municipalities needed to come up with measures to deal with those wasting water, including imposing penalties, and addressing the challenge of leaks on the municipal reticulation system.

“As a country we are experiencing the scarcity of water, yet we allow for up to 40% of our water to be lost to leakage. This undermines our efforts to address water challenges.”

However, in a note “addressing nonrevenue water and unemployment in the City of Joburg” published by the International Water Association, Dr Hendrik Ewerts, Asief Alli, Sudley Stone and Kearabilwe Ratlhagane from the Rand Water Academy said the department estimated the national nonrevenue water was at 36.7%.

“Johannesburg recorded its water losses around 35% for the same period.

“According to [University of Pretoria associate professor in engineering, geology and hydrogeology Matthys] Dippenaar [2015], this substantial quantity of water loss can be ascribed to physical leakages from water infrastructure.”

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In the Joburg Water report, it was acknowledged and accepted that certain levels of water losses could not be avoided and were considered acceptable from an economic perspective, even though they were above the industry norm of 18%.

“This means the cost of interventions to reduce water losses from a technical perspective should be less than the savings to be realised.”

However, Barnes said that “was a misleading statement”.

“To allow infrastructure to run down to the point where it will cost huge sums of money to repair and then to compare that enormous amount of money to the cost of only the water [that] will be saved is misrepresenting the urgency of the consequences of the poor service.”