ENVIRONMENT AND ENERGY
35
Getting to #SurplusWater2025
Water is a finite resource and cannot be created. The volume of
water on the planet is fixed and undergoes a continuous cycle
— the natural water cycle.
By By Gerrie Brink, BEng (UP), MMCC (DMR), MBA (USB)
In the words of Professor Anthony Turton (2012), “Water is a flux
moving in time and space. In fact, we have the same volume on
our planet today as we had when the dinosaurs roamed free 65
million years ago.” Due to the relatively low cost of water, compared to electricity and
other services, and relatively high availability (to date), very little focus
has been placed on the water component of property and business
expenses.
Human intervention or interference within this natural cycle, more
often than not, disturbs the balance of this natural cycle. If this is not
properly managed, it can have detrimental long-term effects on the
water availability balance. However, adding the consumption of a few buildings together,
results in a significant amount. With cost structure differing from one
municipality to another, the cost of water and effluent charges varies
quite significantly across the different municipalities.
These human interventions/inventions/interferences include
the following:
• consumption of more resources than required to sustain a
lifestyle;
• excessive waste generation;
• ineffective wastewater treatment;
• pollution; and
• industrial processes. Data has been collected from more than 40 commercial buildings from
June 2016 to date, by means of smart water meters and data loggers
on the main incoming line of these buildings. These logger units take
readings every 15 minutes and populate them into continuous flow
profiles, indicating consumption patterns and flows. Interrogation of this
data reveals valuable information with regard to consumption patterns,
leaks, and contributing factors to total consumption of a building.
South Africa is the 30th-driest country on the planet, with an average
annual rainfall of only 495mm. This is half the world average. Rainfall
across South African regions ranges from 100mm in some parts of the
country to 1 200mm in others (FAO, 2016). The country is classified
as water scarce, with total annual renewable water resources (TARWR)
of between 1 001 and 2 000m 3 per capita (World Water Assessment
Programme, 2012).
Various sources make predictions for South Africa, of moving into
an extreme water-scarce country by 2025, with a direct impact on
economic growth (WWF-SA, 2017). South Africa is a water-strained
economy with a higher demand than can be supplied by existing
infrastructure and water sources, and 98% of water is already
allocated. This increasing demand is mainly due to deteriorating
infrastructure, inefficiencies, and population growth. This argues
that only by understanding the water consumption patterns, can we
address increased demand due to inefficiencies.
GATHERING THE DATA
The scope for this specific data collection exercise focused
specifically on water consumption at commercial office buildings. The
configurations of these buildings vary from single-storey units to high-
rise buildings, but the main contributors of water consumption remain
fairly consistent and consist of toilets, canteens/kitchens, irrigation
(where gardens are present and irrigated), cooling (evaporative
systems), and cleaning services.
Of all the contributors to consumption, toilets are the highest-volume
contributor of wastewater into the sewage system of a town or city.
www.plumbingafrica.co.za
Factors that aggravate the state of water include population growth,
high rate of urbanisation, and deteriorating infrastructure. Since
1996, the population has grown from 40.58 million people to 55.6
million in 2016 (Statistics South Africa, 2016): an increase of 15
million people in 20 years, with little upgrade to infrastructure. A
large portion of this growth was in urban areas, due to normal growth
as well as urbanisation.
With an increase in urban population, more people have access
to clean water, hence an increase in demand. Due to deteriorating
infrastructure, an estimated 37% of water is lost through leaks.
South Africa is facing an imminent water crisis, and everybody needs
to do what they can to reduce their own water footprint. The cumulative
efforts of individuals can make a significant impact, but there are a lot of
potential savings in the commercial sector.
Since individuals are not responsible for paying for consumption at
their place of employment, a lot of inefficiencies and waste occur:
things like running air conditioning and lights in an empty building
after hours, running irrigation systems while it is raining, leaking
toilets, running taps, long showers, and negligent use of resources.
CASE STUDY
In December 2016, AQUAffection, a company involved with the
#SurplusWater2025 initiative, started with the first project for Emira
Property Fund, by following a simple approach:
1. Understand the history of a building or site.
2. Install an electronic water monitoring device/logger called an
Automatic Meter Reading (AMR) device.
April 2019 Volume 25 I Number 2