[imagesource:here]

It’s not much extra water, and you really can’t go running a bath now.

Yesterday saw Cape Town Mayor Patricia de Lille  inspect the site of an aquifer-abstraction project at the Steenbras Dam, and there’s good and bad news.

The good news is that this leg of the Table Mountain Group Aquifer Abstraction Project will see an extra 10 million litres of potable water being pumped into the system every day.

How? Here’s EWN:

The exploratory borehole at the Steenbras Dam is a sign of things to come: massive pumps extracting groundwater from the aquifer into the dam.

Hey, it’s a start.

And now for the kicker about not getting carried away:

While de Lille visited the site, she expressed concern at the Steenbras Dam’s low water level.

“It’s worrying when you don’t see any water in those dams, because we’re trying everything to avoid that Day Zero.”

…de Lille warns this doesn’t mean that Capetonians can relax their water-saving habits.

“People must not think because they are getting additional water they now can just use water like it used to be. We have to change our relationship with water completely.”

Yeah, we better change our relationship with water or we’re going to suffer a nasty break-up around mid-May, which is when we’re expected to hit ‘Day Zero’ and see the taps run dry.

Whilst tapping into those aquifers seems to be everyone at the braai’s number one solution, one expert says we need to show a little restraint;

Tebogo Mofokeng is a water reuse expert who is concerned about the quality of water in a Cape Flats aquifer.

The aquifer is directly under a horticultural area, which means it’s quite possible that pesticides and fertilisers have found their way into the water.

“There could be, in some cases, infiltration of water that is not treated to the right standard that has polluted the aquifer.”

It’s not just farming related contaminants worrying the water expert.

“I think there’s also general pollution on some of the water bodies that is sitting on that aquifer. It could be the community, pollution in terms of plastics.”

She says it’s important to spend time to improve the water quality.

I think the saying goes that beggars can’t be choosers, so when Cape Town’s taps run dry let’s just hope the water options available aren’t too nasty.

Happy Monday – be lekker and don’t bath.

[source:ewn]