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THE Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality has made special provisions for new equipment to ensure that water is not harmful to residents by regularly testing of the Metro’s water supply.
With the current level 5 water restrictions in the metro, the municipality is finding innovative ways to ensure that water should not only be used sparingly, but that regular safety checks of the metro’s water supplies should be done.
The dam levels are currently 18.18% of total combined capacity as on Monday, August 6.
The municipality has spent just under R1 million on the new equipment to test water samples, which has been used by health practitioners since July 1. The water safety checks are done once per week as opposed to the legislative checks of once per month.
The acting principal environmental health practitioner, Dirk Steyn, said that regular water checks are done to test for chemicals and water born diseases.
“The quality of the water is always 99% and we usually test the pH levels and the visibility of chlorine of the water as well. If chlorine is present, the water is safe from harmful organisms,” he said.
Previously, it took approximately two days for the water samples to be efficiently tested. With the use of the new equipment the results are immediately available with 35 water sampling kits that are taken out to 77 sampling points across the city including reservoirs.
“We always ensured that residents get quality water, but with the equipment that we have now, it’s just more safeguarding and more ensuring that there’s always quality water for our residents. We are just upping our game and keeping up to international standards as well as national legislation,” Member of Mayoral Committee for Public Health, Lance Grootboom.
