Water has been restored, but I am trying to find out what the issue was and how it was resolved.
At 15h00 (Sunday) our reservoir was at 7% and at 18h00, 3 hours later, it was at 20%. This morning, there are reports of no water in Clubview, Rooihuiskraal and a few other areas.
I will get into the technical side in a bit, but first, i need to clarify that the following information is false: the water was not cut due to non-payment from the city's side. It is illegal to cut a basic necessity such as water.
Secondly, it was not only the Laudium Reservoir that went dry:
Atteridgeville High, Parkmore High, Newlands, Olympus, De Wilgers, Wapadrand, Garsfontein, The Reeds, Olivenhoutbosch, Blue Valley and Thatchfield/Samrand were also affected. As you can see, the water cut didn't choose between race, income class, or political affiliation.
The water shortage came from the state operated Rand Water side who issued a notice on the 1st of July stating that they were still experiencing challenges with power failures at pump stations leading to interrupted and limited flow. I was trying to understand why only these reservoirs were affected by the lower pressure.
I can only speak about what i understand about Laudium's Reservoir: in my view, the pressure was low so water couldnt get to the inlet height (explained in the following paragraph) and i think that through the Regional Head's intervention, water was rerouted from another reservoir or inlet to other reservoirs were closed to build pressure to allow our reservoir to be filled (Balancing done by City of Tshwane). Either way, I am grateful for the intervention and to our councillors office for applying pressure.
Since our first water issue in Tshwane in 2014, we learnt the following:
1. Laudium's Reservoir is 100m above the main valve (behind the prison) which means that we need 10bar of pressure to get water to the Reservoir. This means that if pressure in the mainline drops under 10bar (normally around 13bar), our reservoir will not fill, but lower lying reservoirs will be filled. This issue is currently being rectified with a high pressure pipeline which will soon be operational.
2. Laudium's Reservoir does not have overflow protection so it overflows instead of shutting off. Thus wasting thousands of litres of clean water.
3. The Reservoir doesn't have low water level protection which would shut off the outlet when the minimum operating height of around 3 meters is reached. If this level is breached then filling the reservoir is difficult while water is being used by consumers.
4. The reservoir is leaking excessively, and is open at some places on the top and easily accessible.
5. Our pipes are in urgent need of replacement and alot of water is wasted when these pipes burst.
All these faults need to be addressed at multiple sites around South Africa.
It sounds easy but our electricity, sanitation and water infrastructure is aging, without preventative maintenance and, as more users are being serviced, is on the brink of collapse. Think of your home which has not been maintained for 30 years and now you have to do repairs and maintenance with a limited monthly budget while thieves are constantly stealing your windows, doors, and cables and clearing your bank account.
The water saving effort from the residents is appreciated & the work of the local CPF, Laudium Disaster Management and every single person who worked hard to return the service must be commended.
Special mention to all those who opened their boreholes to the public.
We must also realise that pollution plays a huge part in the supply of clean water: The smallest piece of plastic pollution such as a cigarette butt and it's chemicals need to be filtered out of the water so let's not mindlessly pollute our soil and rivers. We can only solve these issues by working together.
Thank you.
Cllr Prajay Ramjee
BTech: Engineering: Mechanical.
Actively working on solutions to better our town 💚
