Cape Town – Western Cape dam levels continue to see slight increases as late winter rain fall across the province.
The average level for dams in the province is currently 66.4%. Last year at this time the level was 64%.
Cape Town's dam levels are up by 0.5% for the past week and are currently sitting at 82.3%.
Collective water consumption for the past week increased slightly to 587 million litres per day but remains within the targeted daily allocation of 650 million litres per day.
“The biggest dam in the province, the Theewaterskloof dam, is currently at 72% (2018: 55%). City of Cape Town dams are on average above 81% full, which is a good place to be ahead of the summer season where demand will spike again,” Minister of Local Government, Environmental Affairs and Development Planning Anton Bredell said on Monday.
Bredell says fuller dams do not mean the province is out of the woods yet.
“This winter we received good rainfall in most areas, but some regions – mostly in the Karoo agriculture sector – has still not had the needed relief.
"Those areas remain under extreme pressure as we head to the summer. We continue to monitor the regions where extreme water stress remains.
"Multiple departments including national water and sanitation and departments of agriculture are working tirelessly to alleviate matters where possible.”
Bredell has repeated the call for consumers across the province to continue to use water responsibly.
“We are headed to the summer and the likelihood of dams increasing much further is extremely low. So we need to now manage the water we have as efficiently as we can over the next few months ahead of the next winter.
"Using less water must become a permanent way of life. The resource will always be under pressure due to factors like climate change, population growth and urbanisation.
"We must learn to do more with less,” said Bredell.
Major dams23/9/2019Previous week% 2018Berg River99.599.5100.0Steenbras Lower99.299.891.7Steenbras Upper90.085.193.9Theewaterskloof72.572.155.8Voëlvlei88.888.390.7Wemmershoek91.691.094.4Total Stored Ml738 870734 137662 653% Storage82.381.773.8