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dam-l SA paper on DSM/LS
This looks like an interesting paper; below is just a bit of its abstract.
The full paper is available from:
http://www.up.ac.za/academic/libarts/polsci/awiru/op5.html
Demand management, a possible alternative to augmentation?
A South African Case Study
by
Steve Gillham and Mike Haynes,
Umgeni Water, South Africa
Abstract
In South Africa, water is a limiting factor to economic growth. As a
semi-arid country with a highly
variable climate, it is predicted that there will be a national water
crisis in South Africa by 2025. To
address this, and other water related issues, the government has embarked
upon a comprehensive overhaul of
existing water legislation. The new Water Act recognises that there are
limits to the development of new
dams and water transfers and strongly advocates water conservation and
demand management.
The task of water resource planners is to reconcile demand and supply. A
case study within the province of
KwaZulu-Natal is used to demonstrate how the projected demand of this
region will be met through the
application of multiple strategies of demand management, integrated
catchment management and
conventional augmentation. The extent to which the proposed major
augmentation scheme can be delayed
through demand management, and the implications that this will have on all
consumers within the region,
are considered.
It is concluded that effective demand management is desirable even in a
relatively wet area such as
KwaZulu-Natal. It is further concluded that such a strategy should be
undertaken as a supplementary
strategy to conventional augmentation schemes, but cannot replace these
schemes totally.
1. Introduction
Water resources planners are continually faced with the challenge of
reconciling water demand and supply. In a situation of
abundant resources, the conventional approach has always been to
develop more dams. Growing global water shortages and
opposition to large dams from the environmental lobby have, however,
called into question the strategy of applying a
conventional water resources development philosophy. Both the Asian
Development Bank and the World Commission on
Dams are currently evaluating a number of large dam projects to
determine the extent to which consideration was given to
alternatives to the project, the extent to which the project has
achieved its objectives, and whether environmental mitigation
was successfully achieved. The current drive for transparency is
leading to far greater scrutiny of the need for large water
resource development schemes, and demanding greater accountability in
decision making.
The intention is to demonstrate a holistic, multiple strategy
planning approach to the efficient use and development of
limited water resources. Through the use of a South African case
study, the following strategies are discussed within the
context of a revised water legislative framework:
Resource management, which applies the principles of integrated
catchment management to the problem of catchment
development and its impacts on runoff;
Conventional water resources development, which includes the
construction of dams and inter-basin transfer schemes to
address water availability from a supply perspective;
Water demand management, which focuses on the efficient use of water
by consumers and which can be used to delay the
implementation of costly water resource infrastructure.
It will be demonstrated that an exclusive focus on a single strategy
is unlikely to achieve an optimal economic balance of
efficiency, sustainability and equity in the use of water resources.
2. Changes in legislation: A new paradigm for water management in
South Africa
South Africa's previous water law applied the same rules of the
well-watered colonising countries of Europe to the arid and
variable climate of South Africa. It has, however, been recognised
that privileged access to land and economic power has
resulted in an inequitable distribution of water rights. With the end
of the Apartheid era, South Africa's water law has been
replaced with a new National Water Act, which was promulgated in 1998.
The new water policy recognises that there are limits to the
development of new dams and water transfers. To provide for
growth and development of the South African economy in the 21st
century, attention is being paid to current water usage
which is often wasteful and inefficient. There has thus been a
paradigm shift in approach to water management: away from
an exclusive focus on building more dams, to one which encompasses
water conservation.
Key principles underpinning the policy proposals for future water
management in South Africa, and germane to the issue of
water quantity, include:
Treatment of all water in the water cycle as a common resource,
subject to common approaches to water resource
management;
Guaranteeing as a right, a "reserve" of water required to meet basic
human needs, and maintain environmental sustainability;
Allocation of water that promotes use which is optimal for the
achievement of equitable and sustainable economic and social
development;
The development of a binding water use, conservation, and protection
policy by all major water use sectors;
The recognition of river catchments as water management areas, and
the provision for the phased establishment of catchment
management agencies, to undertake water resource management in these
areas.
Farming, including dry-land agriculture and forestry plantations
accounts for about half the nation's water use. New
legislation will regulate the impact of these sectors on water resources.
3. Water resources situation in South Africa
South Africa is a semi-arid country with a mean annual rainfall of
about 475mm, which is well below the world average of
860mm. The rainfall is unevenly distributed across the country
leading to periodic droughts which are both severe and
prolonged.
According to Perkins (1998), figures released by the United Nations
rank South Africa as 11th from the bottom on an index
of 50 Countries in the World with the least annual renewable water
availability per capita. South Africa is already below the
water stress level of 1 700 m3/capita/annum, deteriorating from 3 500
m3/capita/annum in 1955 to 1 200 m3/capita/annum
in 1990 and it is predicted that by 2025 the level will be about 700
m3/capita/annum which is below the water critical
threshold of 1 000 m3/capita/annum.
(MORE!)
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Lori Pottinger, Director, Southern Africa Program,
and Editor, World Rivers Review
International Rivers Network
1847 Berkeley Way, Berkeley, California 94703, USA
Tel. (510) 848 1155 Fax (510) 848 1008
http://www.irn.org
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