Supply of water to tanker trucks suspended

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Supply of water to tanker trucks suspended

9:04 CAT | 16 Jan 2017

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As restrictions on water supply bite in the Mozambican capital, the Maputo Regional Water Company (AdeM) has suspended the supply of water to redistributors who use tanker trucks.

There are water points in Matola city and in the Maputo neighbourhood of Chamankulo where tanker trucks used to be able to take on water. Those points have now been closed.

According to AdeM spokesperson Antonio Gulamba, cited in the Maputo daily “Noticias”, closing these points will reduce the pressure on AdeM’s own distribution centres. The water that previously went into tanker trucks now goes into the normal distribution system.

Several companies depend on tanker trucks for their water. These include Maputo car wash companies, which have complained that, if they have no source of water, they will have to lay off staff.

Construction companies use tanker trucks, and the owners of these vehicles also sold water to consumers in areas of Greater Maputo not covered by the AdeM network. There are a number of small, privately owned boreholes which could be an alternative, but their capacity is limited.

Gulamba said that new boreholes are being drilled at Intaka, in Matola, and the tanker trucks will be able to draw water from these.

AdeM expects to reduce the total volume of water produced at the treatment and pumping station on the Umbeluzi river from six million to 4.5 million cubic metres a month. So far, despite the supply restrictions announced by AdeM, measurements indicate that the total amount produced by the company is still running at around six million cubic metres a month.

Each city neighbourhood receives water on alternate days. But many consumers have tanks on the roofs of their homes, which can easily store enough water for a household’s needs for two day.

The flow of the Umbeluzi depends on the amount of water stored at the reservoir of the Pequenos Libombos dam. As of Thursday, the dam was only 13.5 per cent full. Further reductions in the level of the reservoir and of the river will inevitably result in further cuts to the Greater Maputo water supply.

Heavy rains have been falling in Maputo city – but unless it also rains further upstream in the Umbeluzi basin, and particularly in Swaziland, the level of the Pequenos Libombos reservoir will remain critically low.

Source: AIM