Efficient use is only way to beat scarcity
November 10, 2009
By Barbara Schreiner
As I sat down to write this article, the first storm of the season broke, rolling over the house with thunder, lightning and a massive, crashing downpour. And I thought how easily we take water for granted, despite the fact that we actually rely on a huge infrastructure network that carries us through frequent and often severe droughts.
South Africa does not have a natural water system conducive to sustainable economic development - we face limited and irregular rainfall and we have relatively small rivers (at least by global standards). To complicate the issue, our water is not necessarily located where we need it most - Gauteng being the case in point.
South Africa has managed to overcome this difficult hydrology by huge investment in dams and distribution infrastructure. Unfortunately, this infrastructure was aimed primarily at serving the needs of the white minority before 1994. Since then, the country has faced the challenge of extending the benefits of water to the whole population, while grappling with the challenges of driving sustainable economic growth in a context of increasing water scarcity and water pollution.
As an example, if you get your water from the Vaal River system, 2013 should be etched into your mind, since that is the year that water shortages will begin to bite, unless significant water savings are made.
According to the Department of Water Affairs, a 15 percent reduction in municipal water use is required, as is the closing down of a large chunk of illegal irrigation happening in the catchment area. This will have to be achieved before the next dam, Lesotho Highlands Phase 2, can provide water in 2019. Dams can't be constructed overnight - it takes between 10 and 20 years to design, construct and fill a large dam.
So, we need a radical shift in planning and investment in the water sector. We will plan less and less for projects like the De Hoop and Steelpoort dams, which are raising their concrete hulks across the valleys. The reason is that South Africa has dammed most of its prime dam sites and future dams will cost more, for diminishing returns. In some catchments there is no extra water left to capture in dams.
We will have to plan more and more for water conservation and demand management and for the control and reduction of pollution so that our water resources remain fit for use.
This approach is more complex in many ways than building dams. It does not present us with a large project that can solve water shortage. It requires planning to meet diffuse and multi-faceted challenges. And the solutions lie not only with the Department of Water Affairs, but with municipalities, farmers, industry and individual water users. A wide range of institutions and individuals have to rise to the challenge.
Increasingly, the department, water boards, municipalities, and water users must plan for and invest in improved water use efficiency. Within a municipality, this might mean refurbishing pipes and pumps, replacing or installing pressure valves, edcating consumers in water use efficiency, and introducing pricing strategies to drive reduced water use - requiring complex and multi-pronged strategies.
The sad reality, however, is that water services are degenerating in most municipalities due to decades of underinvestment in maintenance and refurbishment and severe understaffing.
Poor payment for services and increasing consumer bad debt is not helping either. The result is increasing water wastage through leaks and bursts, interrupted supply, and increasing river pollution from municipal waste water treatment works.
Over the past 50 years, the state has invested billions of rands in building dams and interbasin transfer schemes. We need to continue those levels of investment in refurbishing and maintaining water infrastructure, from dams down to municipal supply systems.
Unfortunately, when money is tight, maintenance and refurbishment gets cut. Somehow maintenance is always postponed for another day. It also seems easier to find the money for one big dam, rather than for a series of diffuse water saving projects that would result in the same increase in water availability.
Each municipality should have a clear, funded, and implemented maintenance and refurbishment plan, which should indicate how it plans to meet further growth needs within limited water resources. Equally, municipal decision makers (political and administrative) need to realise the shortsightedness of postponing water infrastructure maintenance and refurbishment in a context of water scarcity - let alone how much wasted water is costing them. The costs of water saving projects must be paid for through both water tariffs and major investment by the state.
As we move deeper into water scarcity, the cost of water is going to, and must, increase.
It is time for us to learn to live within our water means. The financial crisis has resulted in calls for frugality, for tightening of belts. In the same way, we must learn to be frugal with our water, to tighten our water belts. This means we must plan well in advance, plan for the best social, economic and environmental solution, and be willing to invest as much in water conservation and pollution management as we invested in dams in the past. It's not too late yet to avoid an Eskom in the water sector.
This article forms part of the WWF/Business Report "Business of Water" series. Barbara Schreiner works for Pegasys Strategy and Development
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