Lower water restrictions for Cape Town come October

With Cape Town's dam levels nearing 70% of storage capacity, the city has announced that it will be conservatively lowering water restrictions and associated tariffs from Level 6B to Level 5 from 1 October.

Photo by Conor Sheridan on Unsplash

Depending on the usage and tariff category, this will bring tariff relief of between 26.6% and 70% per kilolitre of water. The water usage target will be increased from 50 litres to 70 litres per person per day and the daily collective consumption target will increase by 50-million litres to 500-million litres to ensure that water conservation efforts remain in place.

The Western Cape Water Supply System’s dams are now at 68% capacity, a very significant improvement on the situation at the end of the previous winter, when they were at 38% capacity.

Rainfall remains highly variable, and while May and June saw rainfall close to that of an average year, July had very poor rainfall. This improved somewhat in August and so far in September the positive trend continues.

The key elements of Level 5 restrictions are as follows:

An increase in the personal water use limit from 50 litres per person per day to 70 litres per person per day
A resetting of the overall City water usage target from 450-million litres per day to 500-million litres per day
A relaxation of restrictions for commercial and industrial water users from a 45% to a 40% usage reduction
A lowering of tariffs to Level 5 tariffs:

Residential tariffs (excluding VAT)