You obviously don't like this target‚ so here's a different one: Cape Town gets even tougher on water

26 June 2017 - 19:13 By Dave Chambers
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Dam storage levels rose by 1.3 percentage points to 24.5% in the past week‚ but consumption averaged 630 million litres a day. File photo
Dam storage levels rose by 1.3 percentage points to 24.5% in the past week‚ but consumption averaged 630 million litres a day. File photo
Image: Johnny Miller

Having banned the use of water outside as part of level 4 restrictions‚ the City of Cape Town warned residents on Monday that even tougher curbs are on the way.

Level 4b restrictions would reduce the city’s collective water use target to 500 million litres a day — even though residents have not yet achieved the existing 600 million-litre objective.

Dam storage levels rose by 1.3 percentage points to 24.5% in the past week‚ but consumption averaged 630 million litres a day.

Xanthea Limberg‚ the mayoral committee member responsible for utilities‚ said the city council was preparing for the “imminent implementation” of further restrictions.

“The envisaged level 4b restrictions would adjust the water usage target downwards to 500 million litres of collective water use per day‚” she said‚ emphasising that individuals should limit their consumption to 100 litres a day.

“It is incredibly important that we focus on building our reserves at the moment. The danger does exist that we will start exceeding our water usage target due to the cooler conditions and the rainfall that is being experienced at times.

“Our dam levels remain critically lower than usual during the start of the winter. As we do not know how rainfall will pan out‚ we need to make sure that we save water while we have it. I know that many of us are doing everything in our power to use less water and I know it is difficult to keep on saving water‚ especially when the rain falls and the temperature drops‚ but we cannot afford to let our guard down.”

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