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November 18, 2024

Cape Town Is Being Allowed To Pump As Much Sewage Into The Sea As It Likes

Cape Town will have more than just Vaalies floating around its beautiful beaches.

[imagesource:flickr]

Cape Town will have more than just Vaalies floating around its beautiful beaches this December holidays after Environment Minister Dion George ostensibly gave the City of Cape Town a blank cheque to pump an unlimited volume of untreated sewage out to sea.

This was revealed in George’s parliamentary response to a question posed by ActionSA MP Malebo Kobe about the Department of Forestry, Fisheries, and the Environment’s (DFFE) actions against the City of Cape Town for releasing more than 30 million litres of raw sewage into the marine reserve per day.

According to Groundup, Minister George said Cape Town had coastal waters discharge permits for three marine outfalls, situated in Green Point, Camps Bay and Hout Bay. The permits allow the City to discharge 25 million, 11.3 million, and 5 million litres of sewage into the sea per day from each of these outfalls respectively.

The only treatment the sewage receives before being released into the ocean. is to be pumped through a sieve to remove solids.

However, the public and a number of organisations, including the National Sea Rescue Institute, have called for the issuance of these discharge permits – which place restrictions on the amounts of sewage that can be pumped, as well as limits for components like nitrogen, mercury, and cyanide, among others.

“These three permits are all subject to ongoing appeals,” stated George. “However, an interim decision was taken on 28 August 2024, in which the effluent quantity (in other words, flow) limits in the CWDPs (Coastal Waters Discharge Permits) were suspended pending the outcome of the appeals.” He added that the City of Cape Town “is not limited to the daily discharge limits”.

However, the City had already been going beyond the sewage quantity restrictions imposed by the current permits.

Zahid Badroodien, a Mayco member for Water and Sanitation, stated that the average discharge in October exceeded the permission limit by 1.8 million litres per day, while Green Point exceeded the allowed limit by 700,000 litres per day. The discharge volume limit was however not exceeded by the Camps Bay outfall.

The Hout Bay outfall permit was granted by the DFFE in 2019, followed by Green Point in December 2022 and Camps Bay in January 2023. Prior to these, the outfalls operated under a general authorisation from the Department of Water and Sanitation. However, the City did not inform the public or affected parties when it received the permits, preventing the opportunity to appeal.

The issue only came to light in January 2023 when the NSRI inquired about the permits’ status. Appeals were then lodged by the NSRI, ActionSA, Capexit, and others, citing concerns about sewage discharge into a Marine Protected Area, environmental risks, and lack of public participation.

In response, former DFFE minister Barbara Creecy ordered a new public participation process, which closed in November 2023. The appeals remain unresolved, despite Creecy’s acknowledgment that sewage discharge poses significant environmental and public health risks.

Documents obtained by ActionSA in 2023 revealed the City had violated the Hout Bay outfall permit by exceeding discharge limits on 104 of 181 days during the first half of the year and failing to establish a required Permit Advisory Forum. In response, ActionSA filed a criminal case against the City for breaching the Integrated Coastal Management Act.

Additionally, it was disclosed that the DFFE had issued compliance notices to the City in February for violating the conditions of all three outfall permits. A criminal case regarding the Hout Bay outfall was also investigated and referred to the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA), but the NPA has not responded regarding potential prosecution.

A 2017 CSIR report commissioned by the City of Cape Town states that the negative impact of sewage discharge on the aquatic ecosystem depends on its ‘assimilative capacity’.

“The assimilative capacity is essentially a receiving environments ‘pollution diet’ – too much pollutant loading combined with inefficient dilution and dispersion and deleterious effects will manifest.”

While the concentration of contaminants contained in sewage may not cause the death of marine organisms, their persistent introduction may overwhelm the assimilative capacity of a receiving environment in the long-term and result in chronic toxicity (non-lethal effects, such as reduced reproductive potential and growth of aquatic organisms).

“It is not understood why the minister has decided to completely ignore this so-called safe limit and allow the discharge of unlimited quantities of raw sewage for an undefined period.”

Badroodien said the new permits, under the DFFE, make no allowance for stormwater when it rains, or higher volumes caused by peak period flows. He said the city is growing and so are volumes of sewage, and there was no other option at the moment but to utilise the outfalls. However, the City was looking at developing other options for the future.

Until then, the City should perhaps invest in ‘Poo-Spotters’ along its beaches.

[source:groundup]

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