Durban - eThekwini residents may have to fork out more money for water, as Umgeni Water implements a drought levy on the municipality.
The continuing water shortage, caused by below average rainfall over the past 30 months, has so burdened Umgeni Water that it has to impose the levy to ensure that the water currently available lasts until the drought breaks.
Good rains are only expected towards the end of this year.
Spokesman for the KwaZulu-Natal water utility, Shami Harichunder, said the levy - in addition to water restrictions - was to conserve the resource.
eThekwini has been shutting down water supply overnight to meet the 15% restriction. However, those who were still not saving water would pay the price.
According to Harichunder, the levy was tabled in November last year at Umgeni's tariff increase consultation with its customers, water services authorities including eThekwini.
Umgeni charges a levy on the municipality, which includes Msunduzi, and the municipality in turn has to figure out how it will foot this bill.
"The levy is meant to encourage curtailment of water use. This means a reduction in water use will make this resource more resilient to the drought and, in this way, extend assurance of supply," said Harichunder.
"The key factor that determines rand amount to be charged is volume consumed by customers - the less water is used, the smaller the rand value of the levy," he said.
Harichunder said the lack of rain resulted in Midmar and Albert Falls dams remaining consistently at below 50% and 30% respectively. These dams supplied the uMgungundlovu District, Pietermaritzburg and about 80% of eThekwini.
"A drought levy is approved and implemented in exceptional circumstances, in this instance a drought. Approval for implementation is granted by the minister when a drought is officially declared.
"Similarly, a drought levy ceases to exist when a drought ends - when it is officially declared that an area, a province or the county is no longer in a state of a drought," he said.
This had already been introduced in Johannesburg.
The Department of Water and Sanitation has also approved a similar levy for Bloem Water, Overberg Water and Mhlathuze Water.
Johannesburg Water had approved its "restriction tariff" in July, charging residents between 10% and 30%.
Its website detailed that residents who used less than 10 000 litres of water per month were not charged the levy.
Using between 20 000 and 30 000 litres garnered an extra 10% on the water bill, increasing the price of a kilolitre from R24.03 to R26.43.
Between 30 000 and 40 000 meant a 20% increase in the price per litre and more than 40 000, a 30% increase. This meant consumers paid R41.95 instead of R32.27 in Johannesburg.
eThekwini Municipality manager, Sibusiso Sithole, said the city had not taken a decision yet.
He said they would seriously consider it if Umgeni Water went ahead with the matter.
Even then, the matter would only be discussed at the end of next month, at the next council meeting.
Daily News