Water supplies restored in Bulawayo

THE Bulawayo City Council (BCC) has restored water supplies in the city after residents had to endure two days without the precious liquid due to a power outage which affected the water treatment works.

On Thursday, Bulawayo residents woke up to the news that the local authority would not be supplying water to the entire city save for the Central Business District and industry. Town Clerk Mr Christopher Dube attributed that to power outages experienced at Ncema Treatment Works and Fernhill Booster Station.

He revealed that another power outage had caused a loss of pumping at Rochester Pump Station.

In an update on the situation, Mr Dube revealed that pumping had resumed on Thursday evening, with the situation gradually returning to normalcy at the city's reservoirs.

"Following investigations from ZETDC, we resumed pumping and treatment on the evening of 4 November.

Most of the supply reservoirs had stabilised by early morning of 6 November 2021 save for 6J reservoirs.

"We have opened supplies to all areas supplied by the Tuli Reservoir, areas that are supplied by Magwegwe and Criterion reservoirs and Rifle Range. Water supplies may take a while to reach high lying areas as we await for the system to be pressurised fully," he said.

Meanwhile, the local authority could be decommissioning one of its supply dams, Umzingwane by next month as the dam has since reached critical levels. However, the decommissioning of the dam would not be of much significant as the other five dams have water that can easily sustain the city.

According to the latest council report, the city's dams are sitting at 58,7 percent full but the daily consumption rate is still significantly high at 157 megalitres a day.

Umzingwane is expected to be decommissioned on 27 December this year, Lower Ncema; 30 August 2022, Upper Ncema; 11 November 2022, Insiza Mayfair; 16 June 2024, Mtshabezi; 7 April 2025 and Inyankuni is projected to have depleted by 28 October 2025.

"In September 2018, city average consumption was 130 mega litres a day, while the current consumption for September 2021 is 21 percent more at 157 mega litres a day. Another critical point to note was that for the same period January to September in 2015 and 2018, there was a steady increase in waterconsumption into the hotter months.

"However, in 2021 since January, and particularly March 2021 when shedding was relaxed across the city, water consumption had been very high, increasing at a rate of 11,5 mega litres a month," reads the report.

The local authority further revealed that at one point the daily consumption had jumped to 185 mega litres a day, which they noted was a worrying trend.

"Overall water storage in the dams was at 243 million cubic metres. The current consumption trend was at an average of 154,7 mega litres a day while the current average daily raw water abstraction was 98 mega litres a day fortreated water production.
"The total consumption for the month of September 2021 was 4 million cubic metres with a daily average of 154,77mega litres a day. The average daily consumption for September 2020 last year was 105,8 mega litres a day andthese differences in consumption were due to the different shedding regimes in the mentioned periods," reads the report.