The Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality announced on Wednesday that it is taking drastic measures as it battles with high levels of unwarranted water consumption from Metro residents.
The situation with the Metro's main supply dams is fast becoming severe and at a combined 43.1% of capacity there are approximately 12 months of usable water left at current consumption levels.
Executive Mayor Athol Trollip announced at a special briefing at City Hall that the Municipality will now introduce part C of the approved tariff schedule for water for all residential and institutional consumers once damn levels hit 40% total capacity
It means that all domestic consumers using more than 40 kilo liters of water a month will be given a two week notice to fix leaks or reduce consumption, failing which a water flow restrictor device will be installed to limit useage.
Under Part C tariffs, if consumers use more than 24kl a month, they could pay up to R59 for each kilo litre over the limit.
If they use more than 48 kilo litres a month, each kilo litre over that will could cost R196.
Trollip also announced that the Municipality will now introduce part B of the approved tariff schedule for water for Commercial and Industrial consumers.
He warned that the main supply dams' current combined capacity figure of 43.1% was also misleading. "The last 10% of any dam is what you could call dead storeage or silt. We can't abstract water below 10% so to all intents and purposes we have 33% of water available to us out of our water reserves," he said.
