Water and Sanitation Projects at Mogale City Local Municipality
The MCLM appointed various service providers to resolve the water and sanitations in three key areas namely, water reticulation, installation of prepaid meters and sanitation.
The Mogale City Local Municipality (MLCM) project pertained mainly to bulk water and sanitation, including the installation of prepaid water meters at the new Chief Mogale Housing Development. The MCLM was experiencing the following challenges:
- Intermittent water supply arising from insufficient water storage because of the new Chief Mogale settlement
- Faulty water meters and bypasses by some households and business
- Increased Non-Revenue Water (NRW) due to water loss.
The MCLM appointed various service providers to resolve the water and sanitations in three key areas namely, water reticulation, installation of prepaid meters and sanitation. The MCLM expected the prepayment system to improve revenue collection due to a reduction in water loss whilst simultaneously delivering a quality service to urban and poor customers. The MCLM believed that the prepayment system will help customers to avoid debt and remain within their free basic allocation (especially the indigent) and not pay for excessive water usage.
- Improved service delivery on water reticulation
- Improved the municipality’s profitability
- Reduced carbon emissions
- Improved resilience to climate change
- Improved sanitation services
- Improved catchment management
- Sustainable water management systems addressed
- Planned designs differed slightly with actual construction work and this led to the extension of work within the bulk watersewer project. It is therefore critical that drawings should go through quality control and checks by project engineers to mitigate project delays occasioned by re-designing of the projects to suit the current circumstances.
- To minimise the level of tempering with meters, it was important that the Municipality invests in new technology of water meters which led to the households not being able to temper with new meters. As a result of this investment, most households did not bypass the new prepaid systems.
- The installation of new prepaid meters helped the municipality to conserve water and to generate revenue from indigent households if they exceed their allocated water. With coverage of approximately 97% of indigent households, the municipalities was able to minimise Non-Revenue Water (NRW) and the loss of more water.
- Dedicated budget allocations are critical to ensuring sustained and continuous project implementation. This avoids delays arising from the reallocation of budgets to other emerging priorities and further minimises the level of community protests when projects stall. In the case of MCLM, the projects were delayed by 15 days due to community protests.
- Budgeting for security as part of total project costs is becoming a critical consideration to mitigate vandalism and theft. As a result of cable theft and tempering with critical infrastructure like transformers, the newly built pump station ended up discharging effluent from the sewer line along the R41 Randfontein Road.
The DBSA was responsible for the creation of 134 construction jobs and four operational jobs by supporting the water and sanitation projects. In addition, 12 sub-contractors were sourced to help with the installation of water meters. Furthermore, the projects ensured sustainable water supply, changed the behaviour of water users and improved sanitation services and catchment management systems. The projects contributed to the reduction of carbon emission and are in alignment with SDG Goal 6 (clean water and sanitation), SDG Goal 12 (responsible consumption and production) and SDG Goal 17 (partnership for goals) and improved socio-economic development.
Water projects
The municipality constructed a 2.1km bulk water line, 1.1 megalitre elevated tank as well as a pump station with associated equipment and machines. The MCLM procured service providers to supply, deliver, read, install and maintain prepaid water meters to reduce on non-water revenue.
Sanitation projects
The municipality constructed an 880m gravitating bulk sewer line, a new pump station with all related equipment, machines and guardhouse.
An evaluation was undertaken to ascertain the development impact of the water and sanitation projects. The results are presented below:
- Consistent supply of clean water to low-cost social housing development built by government in partnership with the private sector
- Construction jobs: 28
- Operation jobs (security): 2
- More than 2 000 households benefited from the project in Kagiso extension 1, 2 and 3
- Reduced water loss from 33% to 27% per annum
- Construction jobs: 28
- Operation jobs (security): 2
- More than 2 000 households benefited from the project in Kagiso extensions 1, 2 and 3
- 78 jobs created and 12 sub-contractor jobs
- Households manage water consumption daily
- Changed behaviour of water users