12 DESIGN: DEAR MR PLUMBER
A better future for all
By
Vollie Brink, Pr Eng
In the years around the Second World War, we learnt a lot about the erosion of the land and how the stormwater flushed away the soil, leaving big dongas and traces across the land.
Vollie Brink
Vollie Brink is one of the industry’ s longest serving wet service engineers. He continues to serve on SABS committees and has been involved in the Green Building Council Star rating system. Brink continues to consult for various organisations while enjoying a wellearned retirement.
This was seen as a serious threat to the land, agriculture, and dwellings. Camps were held where children were taught about erosion and how to go about the work needed in damaged areas.
I don’ t hear anything about erosion anymore, but new threats have emerged: we don’ t have an abundance of water anymore; instead, we battle with drought in many areas of the country, and the world.
We depend on rainfall and if it does not come, then we must look elsewhere. The only other source we can consider is to look underground. Johannesburg Water has even propagated that people drill boreholes and install pumps and tanks on their properties to ensure an uninterrupted supply of water.
The problem is, I was taught that the underground water originates from hundreds if not thousands of years ago and that it is therefore‘ old’ water. If it is depleted, it will take‘ a very long time’ to replenish.
Many people started drilling for water in my street and in the surrounding area, so much so that we had to wait some time before we could get the drilling company to our property— by then, the borehole was bone dry.
In South Africa, I have found that some rich people insist on having a shower with multiple shower heads and other‘ fancy’ facilities because they can afford it, and then there are millions of people around that do not have clean healthy drinking water— how can this be acceptable?
We hear of scarce water reserves that are polluted by inoperative sanitation works due to lack of maintenance; sewage water being discharged into dams; and reticulation pipe networks that are not maintained and leaking as a result. There are even cases where communal taps are broken and constantly running, wasting indispensable quantities of treated water.
We are staring into a severe water-scarce future and this‘ future’ is around the corner.
We have a world population of over 7.3 billion people, and it is estimated that by 2050 we will have more than nine billion people on Earth. They will need water to survive. They will need food, and to produce food they need water and they need water for all other‘ things’ to survive.
Perhaps the question is, do we have a water problem or a people problem?
According to the Water Act / Constitution, all water, including underground water, belong to us all. If it is used, you must pay for it— which does not happen.
There are water shortages across the world. In some places, the underground water has been depleted to such an extent that the soil has subsided in large areas.
I am sure I won’ t reach 2050 because I would be well over 100 years old, but I often think about the young people. I ask myself why are we‘ fighting’ about so many insignificant issues and why don’ t we take hands and work together to find solutions for the threats staring us in the face. We cannot afford to have the best engineers to search for solutions; yet, we have money to spend on other‘ things’.
In other areas, the wealthy people and conglomerates are buying large areas of agriculture land— the land with underground water reserves— removing the crops and selling the water to the poor people around them.
We are many years away from 1977 and we still do not have water regulations and drawings required for small and large buildings, so we cannot do proper maintenance. We do not even reserve the work of the engineer, leaving it to‘ anybody '.
September 2017 Volume 23 I Number 7 www. plumbingafrica. co. za