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14 responses to “Cape Town: Where Water Is Gold”

  1. ‘We Have H*O*P*E’ | Partout
    March 5, 2018

    […] In the rear-view mirror: Alarm and warnings around Cape Town’s water shortage continue to mount in the absence of rain. Just a few since our blog on the crisis: […]

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  2. annpappas Avatar
    annpappas
    February 28, 2018

    In the end it was maintenance issues, not water shedding but we were without water until yesterday just after lunchtime. Cape Town relies on water storage dams which are usually filled by our winter rains but we did not have enough for the last few years, plus political mismanagement – a lethal combination!

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  3. Karen the summer neighbor Avatar
    Karen the summer neighbor
    February 27, 2018

    Wow, not only is this a fascinating Partout, the comments are very interesting. I was thinking throughout the report that living on a sailboat does train one to use less water, less power, less space. And CPSail said the same thing. I was surprised to see showers are “OK” 6 days a week (Never On a Sunday). I would think every other day would work. I’m heartened that Day Zero is extended to July. Personal conservation works!

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    1. ChezLouisDoris Avatar
      ChezLouisDoris
      February 28, 2018

      I hadn’t thought about the sailboat analogy until Cynthia/CPSail mentioned it, but now I realize that many of the measures we are taking here now were simply routines on Louis’s boat, where you had to live off what the tank would hold for days on end. Of course, there has to be water to store to begin with. I saw a sign at the waterfront yesterday that said, “We can only save water as long as we have water to save.” As America (and the world) drains aquifers that took millennia to create and warms the earth, that becomes more of the issue.

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  4. annpappas Avatar
    annpappas
    February 25, 2018

    We’re rationed to 50 litres a day per person for everything. Every house has a water metre which gets read, or you can read it and send it in, so that is how water usage is monitored. Those who are over using get fitted with the dreaded WMD, (water management devices) which limits usage to 350 litres a day but the problem is that they often break, causing further leakage and wasting of water! And they charge the household R4 000 for the installation! The eastern half of the country has had good rain – some of the dams are now overflowing, so I hope it’s our turn this winter!

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    1. ChezLouisDoris Avatar
      ChezLouisDoris
      February 25, 2018

      Thank you for this information, Ann, and we hope for rain with you. As visitors, the signs of water conservation are easy to spot, but the implementaion is harder to figure out. Just curious: How are workplaces and other public places monitored? A home where folks are at school or work for long hours won’t register as much water as one with people at home, but a commercial site or workplace will register more.

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      1. annpappas Avatar
        annpappas
        February 26, 2018

        All buildings have a water metre and as far as public toilets are concerned, there might come a time when they are all closed but I hope not. I was so cross this morning because our suburb had water shedding this morning, so I couldn’t shower before I came to work! All the water was switched off from 5am! Schools are cancelling sport, so that there will be no need for pupils to shower too.

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      2. ChezLouisDoris Avatar
        ChezLouisDoris
        February 28, 2018

        It’s hard to click “Like” on this. Louis and I have taken on-and-off showering to the next level: We are showering every other day. But all we are doing is playing so this is not the issue for us it would be for working people. Where does drinking water factor in? And where does it come from? We buy all our water here in bottles (which are not recycled, another environmental issue!). We assume that comes from natural sources, does not affect the shortage, and does not count into allowances. Right?

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  5. Debra Avatar
    Debra
    February 25, 2018

    I skipped ahead— I couldn’t resist. The water shortage and efforts do make one wonder. Once in venezuela on an island off the coast I had to do the same. Showers were done with drops- no pressure. Toilets- forget it- all paper was trashed not flushed. It was memorable. The whole region thinking of the day ahead. Wow. And you are right- someone else would have been there so might as well have been you.

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    1. ChezLouisDoris Avatar
      ChezLouisDoris
      February 25, 2018

      We did not have either 24/7 water or electricity when I lived in Mexico for nearly two years. You adapt! And, if you’re smart, take the lessons with you. I have never lived with the same profligacy ever since.

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  6. cspsail Avatar
    cspsail
    February 24, 2018

    So interesting to read this while living on a boat full time with 70 gallons of fresh water total. We figure we use 10 gallons per day for the two of us but of course the toilet flushes with sea water and we don’t do laundry on board. But I think learning to be very careful with water, fuel and battery use is a great thing! It carries over to living on land, for sure.

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    1. ChezLouisDoris Avatar
      ChezLouisDoris
      February 25, 2018

      Does that count drinking water? We’re not sure how that factors in here. Humans need to drink water, too, but most of that seems to come in bottles. At least those for those who can afford it. Which is not most people.

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  7. Glen Keiser Avatar
    Glen Keiser
    February 24, 2018

    Just one thought: Capetown proposed infrastructure development several years ago that would have increased reserves and the ability to capture water. The federal government, which had to agree, refused to act. The current crisis is as much man-made as is it a result of changing natural conditions Government — our collective effort as a community — can save us, if we allow it to. Glen

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    1. ChezLouisDoris Avatar
      ChezLouisDoris
      February 25, 2018

      We have heard a lot of different local takes on the shortage. This is one. A related one is that the SA government has a death wish for Cape Town and killed infrastructure development as a result. A wholly different take is that Cape Town has always had an abundance of water so nobody saw this coming or knew how to prepare. It’s all very interesting. Dry but interesting.

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Month: February 2018

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