Estate. Through the use of established boreholes, a water purification plant, wastewater treatment for recycling and re-use as well as storm water harvesting, the estate is able to ensure sustainable water usage.
‘ We realised early on that a lack of appreciation for our resources, one being water, would negatively impact the estate’ s sustainability and future value,’
Uys adds.‘ Our aim is to ensure that, at Arabella, we do our utmost to reduce our demands on the Western Cape’ s precious water supplies and keep our estate functioning at the highest standards.’
rest is provided by an on-site dam.‘ Those boreholes are all monitored in detail,’ Parsons says.
Over the years, Arabella has consistently been awarded full ISO 14001 Certification, which is an international standard that sets out the requirements for an environmental management system. This helps to improve environmental performance through more efficient use of resources, and reduction of waste, enabling the estate to identify, manage, monitor and control environmental issues in a holistic manner. Like all ISO management system standards, ISO 14001 includes the need for continual improvement of an organisation’ s systems and approach to environmental concerns. We take a reading on the groundwater level every three hours, and other measurements are taken every day, so it’ s intensely monitored. Arabella’ s estate management team really do a good job of this, and I have to compliment them on the way they manage their water. As you can imagine with the drought, everybody has been very nervous about water usage, but Arabella’ s groundwater supply has not been impacted in the least. We have increased the frequency of monitoring and reporting, just to keep an eye on it, and there have been absolutely no issues.
A recent study by Parsons and Associates confirmed that this careful management of the estate’ s groundwater supply scheme has resulted in groundwater successfully meeting the estate’ s water demand, with no apparent negative or significant impacts. Based on the results of the monitoring from October 1997 to the present, it can be seen that Arabella Country Estate is using their groundwater resource sustainably – in spite of three successive years of below-average rainfall.
‘ Over the past 20 years we have taken action to forge longterm sustainable plans regarding water and our immediate environment to ensure sustainability, and to mitigate many future issues,’ says Dirk Uys, Estate Manager for Arabella Country
Between its 18-hole championship golf course, its 237 freehold lifestyle estate properties, and its fully fitted 145-room luxury hotel and spa, Arabella experiences a high demand on its water supply. The golf course, naturally, is particularly thirsty. However, Parsons says that the estate’ s management teams work closely together to ensure that everybody shares the water fairly and sensibly.‘ Arabella has a system whereby the different components of the estate – the hotel, the home owners and the golf course – all get charged for water,’ he says.‘ The water supply is very tightly managed between those three components, and everybody has come to the party to ensure that the water supply is managed responsibly.’
Ultimately, Parsons says, the secret to Arabella’ s success lies in how they have devised a plan for sustainable groundwater management, and then worked to develop and maintain that system.‘ The system works,’ he says,‘ and that’ s largely due to their attitude and approach. They take great care and pride in the way they manage their resources, and because of that they’ re in great shape.’ www. arabellacountryestate. co. za
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