Time to panic about water - expert
2011-02-19 14:10
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Johannesburg - South African metropolitans are heading for a major water crisis in 2020, a former director general of the department of water affairs has warned.
Mike Muller, who now serves as an adjunct professor at the University of the Witwatersrand and sits on the national planning commission, said at a Water and Energy Forum in Sandton this week that it was time for metropolitans to start "panicking" about their water supplies.
"I really do think in most of our metros, if we don't panic now, if we don't take action now, we will be in a crisis by 2020," Muller said in comments quoted by the Saturday Star newspaper.
"We're not going to run out of water, but there are some hotspots. EThekwini is actually the most vulnerable metro at the moment - they've been living a charmed life."
Muller said eThekwini "should" have run out of water during the 2010 World Cup and that it "should" run out of water during the UN climate change talks this year, but the metro would "probably get away with it".
No planning
"We know many municipal users are not planning at all, or if they are, they're not acting on their plans," Muller said.
"All stakeholders must... move into action or we're in trouble. I think we need to panic at the right time and the right time is now."
Muller said the Vaal system in Gauteng looked "disastrous".
"We look as though we're 25% short of water for the next ten years," Muller said.
"By the time we implement phase 2 of the Lesotho Highlands Water Project [in 2019], we'll have been at risk for 10 years. Guaranteed there will be a drought."
He blamed farmers in the Vaal for stealing water for irrigation as well as water leakage and inefficient water use.
Muller said good water management was key to growth and development.
He said environmental campaigners around acid mine drainage, actually "distract" from the main challenges around water quality and were "more about" companies trying to make profits out of the tail end of the mining industry.
- SAPA