Johannesburg water collapse – 2,300 burst pipes, 422 leaking valves, and 42 leaking reservoirs

Johannesburg’s water systems are on the brink of collapse, with urgent intervention needed to avoid Day Zero in South Africa’s richest city. 

The City of Johannesburg’s (CoJ) water challenges are well documented, with sporadic water shortages hitting the city over the past few years. 

Water Minister Pemmy Majodina, in a recent press briefing, made clear that the root cause of water shortages in Joburg is the collapse of its infrastructure. 

She explained that there is enough water in the province’s dams, with the Vaal Damn being able to be topped up by other storage facilities in Gauteng. 

“The Vaal Dam is sitting at 33%. Be that as it may, that water is enough. Only when the levels drop to 18% will we begin to tap other dams in the province,” she said. 

Rand Water is already abstracting the maximum amount of water it can from the Vaal River System under the licence granted to it by the Water and Sanitation Department. 

Until Phase 2 of the Lesotho Highlands Water Project is completed, Rand Water cannot increase the amount of water it supplies to Gauteng. 

“Rand Water is, therefore, not able to supply any more water to the municipalities of Gauteng. The water being abstracted is enough to meet demand,” Majodina said. 

This means that the main issue facing Gauteng, and particularly Johannesburg, is getting the water from the bulk supplier, Rand Water, to the end user. 

This has proven difficult for Johannesburg as its water infrastructure has deteriorated to the point where nearly half of all water is lost before it reaches the end user. 

“What we are going through in Gauteng is self-inflicted pain by municipalities, where they did not do what is necessary to adequately maintain their infrastructure.” 

“The system is very vulnerable to disruptions caused by failing infrastructure or spikes in demand.” 

At a meeting of officials from the national government, Gauteng, and Johannesburg Water, it was revealed just how bad of a state the province’s infrastructure is in. 

In particular, Johannesburg’s infrastructure is facing collapse under the pressure of elevated demand. 

As part of efforts to tackle the crisis of water leakages and infrastructure collapse, 12,100 kilometres of pipelines have been surveyed in Johannesburg. This revealed the below. 

• 2,396 burst pipes 
• 6,727 leaking meters 
• 442 leaking valves 
• 259 leaking fire hydrants

These issues have been flagged and are in the process of being repaired, with the potential to save the city 9,457 million litres of water annually. 

More concerningly, however, is that of the city’s 80 reservoirs, around 42 are leaking, and only 11 are being repaired. 

“The city must reduce the leaks in its water system and complete its current projects to construct more reservoirs and pumping stations to make its system more resilient,” Majodina said. 

Joburg Mayor Dada Morero said the city is hard at work in this regard and is busy constructing a new reservoir in Brixton that should come online early next year to ease constraints in surrounding areas. 

Morero said the city is working to fix major leaks at its reservoirs and pumping stations but explained that it is financially limited in what it can do. 

“We need R1 billion just to deal with our reservoirs, with around 45 needing to be refurbished as they are leaking,” he said. 

This cost does not include the overhaul needed at the city’s pumping stations or improvements to its pipe network. Morero said the city is also busy replacing 685 pressure valves. 

“We are currently budgeting around R1 billion to fix leaks, but we need much more, and we do not have the budget for it.

“So, we are looking at other ways to raise capital to address water infrastructure challenges.”