Director General Phillips says it will take ‘a year or two from now’ for the Rooiwal Wastewater Treatment Works to be completely fixed, but residents will receive clean water in October.
The Department of Water and Sanitation has confirmed that the water woes in Hammanskraal are coming to an end following a resolution which will see taps in the area running clean drinking water in October.
The Rooiwal Waste Water Treatment Works (WWTW), run by the City of Tshwane, has been dysfunctional due to negligence for years.
Hammanskraal has struggled with a lack of clean drinking water for many years, which was made worse by the deteriorating Rooiwal WWTW.
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‘A year or two’ for completion of Rooiwal WWTW repairs
Speaking to Power FM on Tuesday, the department’s Director General Dr Sean Phillips said there is progress on the Rooiwal WWTW repairs.
Phillips said the first phase of running clean water in Hammanskraal will be implemented in October.
For the past two years, residents obtained water from water tankers.
“The people of Hammanskraal don’t have to wait until the Rooiwal Wastewater Treatment Works are completely fixed, which will still be about a year or two from now,” said Phillips.
Temba Water Treatment
Due to the Rooiwal WWTW not properly functioning, untreated sewage flowed into the Apies River. It was drawn out to be treated for drinking water quality by the City of Tshwane Temba Water Treatment Works.
The city told the residents of Hammanskraal not to drink the water from the taps due to the polluted water at the Temba Treatment.
“We being the national department agreed to work with the City of Tshwane together with our entity called the Magalies Water Board to assist the City of Tshwane to try and resolve the problem,” he said.
Sewage spillages in Emfuleni
At the Emfuleni Local Municipality, there have been sewage spillages going in the Vaal River from four wastewater treatment works in the area.
“So for a couple of years now with funding from the National Government, Rand Water has been working with the municipality to assist them to address the sewage spillages.”
The quality of the effluent from the wastewater treatment works which goes into the Vaal River started to improve.
“In the rest of Gauteng, there’s been high population growth and the amount of sewage going into those wastewater treatment works is more than they were designed to be,” Phillip said.
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