The City of Cape Town has launched a water map with the aim of creating a renewed sense of consciousness around water consumption in the drought plagued city.

The map forms part of the municipality’s water saving efforts and was established to help curb residential consumption which accounts for approximately 65% of the city’s water allocation according to the municipality.

Residential properties using less than 10 500 litres of water per month are marked on the map with green dots.

Only free-standing houses reflected

The water map currently only shows consumption for free-standing houses and not clusters, flats or other land uses. It also does not show households that use more than 10 5000 litres per month. The map shows consumption for the previous month and is updated around the third week of the following month.

“By making consumption information available, we believe it will assist residents and communities to better manage water consumption. It is crucial for everyone to play their part. The City will continue with extensive enforcement but it is not possible to police consumption at every household,” the city said.

Avoiding Day Zero

“The map shows that many households across Cape Town are working hard to save water as part of the effort to get us through our worst drought. Some 54% of our consumers are saving water to avoid Day Zero, which is estimated to kick in on April 22 2018,”the city added.

The municipality urged residents to reduce their household consumption within the water restriction limits.

“While consumers save, the City is pulling out all the stops to deliver additional water as fast as possible from groundwater, desalination and water reuse sources,” the city concluded.