Is "Day Zero" real?

People are wondering if "Day Zero" is real or if it is a fabrication by our politicians to raise prices by 500% in two years.

Here is my answer:

Water needs to have a real value. And people need to realise that Water is an essential fact of life. If we want to be alive next week, we need good quality, healthy, living (oxygenated), water.

Day Zero has only been pushed out if it rains (on time). It is still very much a reality.

Hundreds of thousands of people are installing rainwater tanks.

Almost everyone is using a grey water system, ie recycling shower water for their toilets and washing-up water for their gardens.

Some people are installing systems to make ground water clean either only for garden and swimming pool use or even making the ground water potable.

Some people have installed systems to make their swimming pool water drinkable. This makes their swimming pools into reservoirs. And it is much healthier too. Oxygenated water is much more healthy than chlorinated water. These reservoirs don't have any chlorine in them.

Free-riders in a community are normally 60% of the community. e.g. in Milnerton, only about 40% of people are members of the Milnerton Crime Watch. We pay for two cars that run 24 hours per day and now we have a cyclist as well. The other 60% effectively get this service free of charge. The same goes for the police service. 3 million taxpayers pay for this service. The rest of the country get this "for free".

And water is no different.

But just as we got to the point of having no electricity load shedding, so we will get to the point of having no water load shedding.

Of-course, 10x price increases in electricity over five years and 500x increases in water costs over two years, has meant that government has said to everyone "look for alternatives and try not to use our services". I'm guessing that government isn't stupid. At some point their huge price increases will mean that we won't need their services, as is normal in all service providers. At this point, government becomes irrelevant. e.g. we don't need their electricity, we don't need their water, we don't need their food, we don't need their education, we don't need their transport services; the list goes on.

One way government can start bring us back into their fold is to reduce water and other government induced pricing.

Another way is for government to provide the water and electricity and services that a well run city needs. For example, a well run city in California allows its citizens 400 litres per person per day. Before the drought Capetonians were using 150 litres per person per day, and wondering why there is so much unemployment, etc.

And the minimum quantity of water required in a city with waterborne sewerage is 87 litres per person per day. Asking us to us 50 litres per person per day is a crime!

We didn't design our city systems. Planners and architects and politicians did. We live in these cities and try to do our best with what we have. At some point the City of Cape Town needed to say "we will get to 87 litres of water per person per day within two years, ... and then we will need to ensure that our water augmentation schemes are in place."

Water is an abundant resource on our finite planet. Some with energy. With food, etc.

It is just that we have been brainwashed (socialised) into believing that water and electricity and food and internet time is scarce, whereas in fact it is almost infinite.

And we have also been brainwashed into believing that we need cars and computers and other appliances and computer games and holidays etc, whereas in order to be alive next week, we need a good healthy environment (air), a safe place to sleep and stay (security), a good water source, and a good food source.

Being alive next week should be our highest priority. Everything else should be subservient to this goal.

Cape Town Water Crisis: How to cover our dams

A new year, a new idea :

Imagine if we could cover all our dams?

So we can!!

We can put systems in our pools to make our pool water drinkable.

We can cover our pools. Our water bill dropped by more than half when we installed our pool cover in 2015. "Power Plastics pool covers reduce evaporation by more than 98%". From their website. I don't work for them.

And this can even be done at Newlands Swimming Pool and our other Municipal Pools.

So:
1) If you have a pool cover, AND
2) If you invest in a system that makes your pool water drinkable, AND
3) If you sign an agreement with the City to allow them to take out whatever you put in from 1st January 2018 onwards ...

Then: You can fill your pool using potable water. And you can install your swimming pool water management systems before tax and before VAT.

If we fill our pools and keep them covered and clean, we can reduce our dam evaporation by 98%. Using Embedded Water.

Happy 20 18. Let's think differently.

PS: I'm sure there are people on this group who know:
1) how many pools there are in Cape Town.
2) how many litres of water there are in these pools.
3) what the evaporation is from the dams.
4) how much water can be saved, and what this system will cost.

Keeping rainfall and water tanks clean

http://www.health.gov.au/…/ohp-enhealth-raintank-cnt-l~ohp-…

Thanks to the Australian Department of Health.

Note that the link I've sent takes you straight to the section on cleaning your water and tank.

We have reached an unpassible point in Cape Town

The latest "Day Zero". It was 20th May 2018.

Just a reminder that the water consumption in a well run city is 400 litres per person per day.

We are currently at 87 "allowed".

We have halved our consumption in the past two years from 1,2 billion litres per day to 600 million.

Getting from 600 million to 500 million sounds easy, but when you started from 1,2 billion, each 100 million gets more and more difficult until it gets impossible.

And the City made 20th May 2018 "Day Zero" based on the unrealistic goal of 500 million litres per day. Forgetting about summer. Forgetting about the heat and wind. Forgetting about the visitors to Cape Town, one of the top cities to visit in the world. http://www.capetownetc.com/news/cape-town-top-city-telegraph-travel/

We are now at that impossible and unpassible point.

The city must understand that we cannot get below 600 million litres per day.

We need the water we need to use and we also need the water borne sewerage. As guaranteed in our constitution, water services act and South African Human Rights commission, and as guaranteed due to the design of modern cities.

This is the way the City designed our system.

It is truly their problem now.

No more load shedding will work, unless people actually defect in large numbers and just take responsibility for themselves.

Cape Town Drought Disaster

We have been spoilt. Now we must get back to basics. And relearn who we are. And not depend anymore.

Cape Town: February 2018?

A documentary about Water in Cape Town!!

There is a very good chance that our water sources will run dry in February, 2018, less than three months time! We should be doing everything possible to avert this disaster, even if it means temporarily drilling into the aquifer or sinking well points, and BTW, many houses have had well points for decades in this City and in many others, without anyone telling us off.

Of-course large scale desalination is still required and the City's attempt at adding 20 million litres a day to fix the problem is really too little too late.

We need 2.4 billion litres of water a day to be considered world class. Before the crisis we were using 1.2 billion litres of water a day. Now, two years later we have already halved our water consumption and we are under 600 million litres a day and now the council have asked us to reduce our consumption to under 500 million litres a day. We will get there. And we are all learning a great deal about how to conserve water and to go back to the days before government told us that they could support us with cheap food, cheap electricity, cheap water and cheap transport. We have millions of years of doing things ourselves before governments turned up 80 years ago and started spoiling us.

And Israel has shown that desalination can be done at R7.50 per kL and most people who actually pay for water in Cape Town already pay this.

We have been spoilt. And now it is time to clean ourselves up and do things ourselves, again.

My recommendations to dramatically speed up investment in getting solutions on the ground:

1. Allow private people to invest in all water and electricity (we still have an electricity crisis) and sewerage infrastructure before tax and before VAT.
2. Incentivise people to convert their pools from chlorine and salt to oxygenated pools that contain drinking water.
3. Incentivise people to not use water from the grid. Adding a water Levy is counter to this.
4. Start a crowd-funding campaign to raise money for a large scale desalination plant in Cape Town
5. Create a database of preferred supplies.

When it rains, pour on the gratitude. David Lipschitz's letter to the Cape Times. Friday 27th January 2017.

Dear Editor

Photo by David Lipschitz

It seems to me that we need to find alternative ways of thinking about our water crisis. Pool covers, well-points, boreholes, dehumidifiers, water restrictions, water tanks, etc, are all great, but are there any other ways of bringing rain?

Rain dances and prayer meetings have also been suggested and shouldn't be poo-pooed. I personally pray for rain, and when it rains I make a point of watching the rain and going outside to celebrate and sing in the rain. I even set my alarm for the early hours when rain is predicted.

We hear how important affirmations and gratitude are.

Let's not take our rain for granted and let's celebrate and enjoy it as much as possible.

Yours faithfully,
David Lipschitz
Milnerton