The City of Cape Town municipality is battling to bring down water use during a protracted drought. Are residents in formal housing the biggest culprits?
Cape Town’s wet winter is much drier than usual and city officials are pleading with residents to help build up the city’s water reserves.
Reporting on the dire state of affairs, news agency GroundUp discussed a number of the city’s projects to conserve water.
The article highlighted that “65% of [city] water goes to formal residential customers. Half of that is used for non-essential purposes – filling pools, watering gardens, washing cars and so forth.”
With dams supplying the city currently only 31.1% full (21.1% of this being usable), are these reported consumption figures accurate? We set out to check.
This story was first published by the Africa Check, a Wits Journalism project. Please click on the following link to read the full article: Do formal residents use 65% of Cape Town’s water, with half going to gardens & pools?
