Here are the pros and cons of desalination, groundwater and recycling
By GroundUp Staff
Water will probably continue to flow through Cape Town’s taps throughout 2018. That’s because of the huge effort by most residents of the city and surrounding municipalities, as well as many farms, to save water.
But the drought is not yet over, and the Western Cape’s long-term rainfall average appears to be declining, probably due to climate change. This is why government, national and local, is planning to supply the city with new sources of water.
Here we explain what Cape Town’s water supply will probably look like in future. Even more important than supply, and much more affordable, is reducing the amount of water we use for the long run (which is called demand management). That we’ll discuss in an upcoming article.
More water can get to the city by increasing the supply of water to the dams, desalinating sea water, using groundwater (water buried underground) and spring water (which is also groundwater), and recycling water in the city’s sewage system.