Infrastructure

Cape Town launches first desalination plant

22 May, 2018

Desalination plant at Strandfontein is first of several under construction.

Cape Town's first desalination plant became operational on 21 May as the drought-hit city looks to its sea for alternative water supplies.
Located at Strandfontein on the False Bay coast southeast of the city centre, the plant is currently producing around three million litres of water a day, with the goal of reaching a daily production rate of seven million litres within a week.
However this volume is literally a drop in the ocean compared to the requirements of Cape Town residents whose average daily water consumption is well in excess of 500 million litres.
The plant is the first of the city's small-scale desalination plants which extract sea water before treating it, directing it into the city's water supply and pumping the brine back into the sea.
Cape Town recently postponed its so-called "Day Zero", when the city runs out of water, from April 2018 to an unannounced date in 2019.