Emfuleni’s oldest industry still keeps its vigil on the Vaal River
VANDERBIJLPARK. – It is ironic that the most important natural feature of Emfuleni, the Vaal River, is taken for granted. With the exception of local tourist operations, farmers and riverfront residents, on the banks of the Barrage, the river seldom features in local environmental thinking.
Were it not for the Vaal River, one of Emfuleni’s oldest industrial operations, Rand Water, would not have been here. Since the 1910s, as the ground and surface water supplies of the rapidly developing Witwatersrand, started running out of reliable local water supplies, the Rand Water Board, nestled itself in on the banks of the Vaal at Vereeniging Vaalweekblad reports.
As of 1913 extensive planning, followed by comprehensive construction works in 1916, boosted local development in Vereeniging. The company town established by Lewis & Marks, had its origins when the Vereeniging Estates Company started coal mining operations in 1878. By the 1900s coal mining operations attracted diverse industries.
Local power stations generated electricity, making it possible for Vereeniging Refractories, and the Union Steel Corporation (USCO) to drive their energy and water hungry operations. Vereeniging’s population increased from about 2 000 residents in 1911 to 5 443 in 1921.
Apart from electricity, the Rand Water Board’s water supply was a key component of keeping local industries and the world’s largest gold mining operations operational on the Witwatersrand.
The Vaal River Barrage, about 40km downstream of Vereeniging was the main storage facility of water thirsty towns and industries. At the time of completion in 1923 the Vaal River Barrage could store 61 349 Megalitres of water. The Barrage’s capacity was well in excess of the existing demand for water on the Witwatersrand – about 80-100 Megalitres per day.
The Witwatersrand had been growing at a pace since the 1890s. Urban sprawl, extensive mining operations, industrialisation and the fastest urban population growth in Southern Africa, created a demand for copious amounts of clean water.
Within the first decade of the founding of Johannesburg in 1886 local surface water had become polluted and unsafe for human consumption. By the 1890s mostly groundwater was used from dolomite aquifers at Zuurbekom, south of Johannesburg, Zwartkopjes to the south-east of Johannesburg and at Springs on the East Rand.
These water resources were finite and unable to keep ahead of the demand for more water by the local industries and municipalities on the Witwatersrand.
The Rand Water Board, founded in 1903, was a water utility, started up by the municipalities and the mining companies on the Witwatersrand – an example of a farsighted public-private partnership that lasted for a significant period of the twentieth century.
The head office was at Commissioner Street in the Marshalltown business hub of Johannesburg. The Vereeniging operation, on the banks of the Vaal River, was the operational hub and supply source of South Africa’s largest water board.
Today more than 17 million people in Gauteng and parts of the provinces of Free State, North West, Mpumalanga and even Limpopo, depend on Rand Water’s Vaal operation.
Rand Water, has been monitoring the Vaal River in collaboration with the national Department of Water and Sanitation since the early 1920s.
Up to the present Rand Water maintains its vigil on Barrage’s water quality.
On the website reservoir.co.za Rand Water weekly reports to the public on the water quality at 10 strategic sampling points on the Barrage. Most dangerous pollutants are E. coli and Blue green algae (responsible for skin irritations, infections and intestinal disorders). There are also some algal pigments in the water. They form scum and cause smells on the river.
Especially E.coli. remains a prime health threat to humans and animals. In the Barrage area, frequently up to one million parts per 500ml have been measured over the past two decades – well above the permissible 10 parts per million.
The culprits are about 15 wastewater treatment works feeding into the Barrage from the tributaries of the Suikerbos and Klip rivers, and the Taaibosch- , Leeu- and Rietspruit.
The apparent ‘return of nature’ as a result of 2020s Covid-19 shutdown in South Africa, has not yet significantly registered on the Vaal River Barrage, according to Rand Water’s Francois van Wyk, manager of the Barrage catchment.
The water quality appears to have improved slightly – primarily as a result of the recent rainfall in the catchment area. Yet it is not enough to significantly improve the water quality.
Rand Water estimates that as much as 78% of all water flowing into the Barrage from the Klip River, constitutes industrial effluents and limited quantities of acid mine drainage (AMD) from Witwatersrand old mines in the central and eastern basin. The industrial operations are currently at an all-time low. The water quality remains undesirable.
Imagine how things could have been. If only all local authorities had properly maintained and upgraded wastewater treatments works before the countrywide shutdown.
- Johann Tempelhoff is an extraordinary professor at North-West University’s campus in Vanderbijlpark.
- https://vaalweekblad.com/60466/emfulenis-oldest-industry-still-keeps-its-vigil-on-the-vaal-river/
