Johannesburg Water has been undergoing a 58-hour maintenance shutdown of a significant chunk of its water system, leaving residents in some parts of the city without water. The shutdown, which began on Tuesday, 11 July, has been implemented to allow for pipe upgrades in Rand Water's system, aiming to improve the availability and reliability of the water supply. The project includes installing valves and a portion of the pipe to enable interconnectivity of the three engine rooms at Rand Water's Eikenhof pumping station. The pumping station pumps water from Rand Water's purification plants, which purify water from the Vaal Dam to various water systems and reservoirs across Gauteng. Valves will also be replaced at the Zwartkopjes pumping station, as well as at the Vereeniging and Zuikerbosch water treatment plants, which treat water that comes from the Vaal Dam.
Several booster pumping stations will be affected, including Daleside, Zwartkopjes, and Eikenhof. The municipality's Johannesburg Water said customers in higher-lying areas will experience the outage for longer as the network gradually recovers. Areas not affected by the Rand Water shutdown include the Midrand and, more significantly, Sandton areas. However, a part of Sandton supplied from the Dunkeld reservoir will be affected.
Johannesburg Water has deployed stationary tankers in critical areas such as hospitals, clinics, municipal offices, schools, and police stations while roaming water tankers will be deployed to the affected suburbs. However, the entity has pleaded with residents not to approach critical sites such as hospitals and clinics to fetch water, as this will drastically reduce the health facilities' water supply. Johannesburg Water has provided 149 stationary tanks and 65 water trucks to mitigate the water shortage during the Rand Water shutdown. The Johannesburg Metro Police Department (JMPD) is also assisting the Soweto depot in providing security for water tankers to ensure they can deliver water safely to Soweto communities.
The water shutdown is necessary to provide a window period for maintenance that cannot be executed while the plant is operational. Professor Anthony Turton, a water resource management specialist at the Centre for Environmental Management at the University of the Free State, agreed that maintenance of this scale necessitates a shutdown. The shutdown allowed the entity to improve infrastructure reliability and availability, reduce unplanned infrastructure breakdowns, allow flexibility during maintenance, and upgrade old critical water supply infrastructure.
As of Wednesday afternoon, the progress of the work on the Daleside Booster Pump Station, Zwartjkopjes Booster Pump Station, and the Soweto, South of Johannesburg and Lenasia systems have been affected.
