Dam levels in the City of Cape Town have declined by 0.9% over the last week to 74.8 % of storage capacity.

According to the municipality this drop is largely due to evaporation caused by the hot weather as well as a related increase in water usage.

“The average water consumption increased by 37 million litres per day to 593 million litres per day for the past week,” the city noted in a statement.

The City has urged residents to adhere to the Level 5 water restrictions that are currently in place and refrain from watering gardens or topping up swimming pools with municipally-supplied water. “The Level 5 tariffs are still on the higher end of the tariff scale and thus water still costs more,” it added.

The municipality noted that it expects the National Department of Water and Sanitation to make its decision known in December about what the water usage limit for Cape Town will be for the year ahead.

“Until then, it is required that water usage remains in the lower 500 million litre usage band,” it concluded.