Cape Town

A city of 4 million people – is just months away from running out of fresh water. In just under 130 days, Cape Town water reservoirs and other water sources will hit a critical low of 13.5%. At this point, the city will be forced to implement a strict water-rationing system. Citizens of Cape Town may have to stand in line surrounded by armed guards just to have access to about 25 liters of water a day. To put that in perspective, that is less than what an average person with a water-saving shower head will use in four minutes of showering. 

Global Epidemic

Easy access to clean water is something many of us in the Western World take for granted but we should consider ourselves very lucky. Mexico City, Jakarta, Sao Paulo, Beijing, Cairo, Bangalore, Tokyo, and London are eight major cities around the world other than Cape Town heading towards the same path. In fact, by the year 2030, it is estimated that only 60% of the world’s population will have access to clean water. According to the United Nations, a quarter of the world’s population already faces an economic water shortage. Water usage is growing at more than double the rate of the population increase. 

Solutions

Water Recycling/Sewage Treatment

In 2013, Thames Water said that unless action was taken, London, UK would be facing a deficit of 125 million liters per day. The company proposed a solution to the predicted water shortage and launched a consultation on water recycling. The idea of treating sewage water, putting it back in the Thames and then treating it again. Of course, when given the option, very few people would want to drink sewage water. Even if it has been treated multiple times. 

Desalination Plants

In the UAE, just a single desalination plant produces 2.13 billion liters of drinking water a day from the sea. Traditionally, sea and ocean water is not drinkable because of the high salt content. These plants are able to solve this problem. Although the technology has been around for some time, it has been underutilized because of the high cost. With technological advancements, the cost has decreased in the past years but these plants still require a large investment. 

Fog Catchers

Although well-known by many near Lima, Peru and other select cities around the world, the technology is typically, unknown by many. With current technology, a single 55m² fog catcher can produce on average 500 liters of water a day.  Fog catchers have been mainly been used on a small scale typically by NGOs because they were not profitable enough. However, with recent breakthroughs at Virginia Tech, fog catchers may be able to produce upwards of 1500 liters of water a day. This would finally allow the technology to be globally scaled and implemented in many cities around the world with high levels of fog to supplement the existing water sources. My new start-up Nebula is a social enterprise with a mission to scale fog catchers globally and profitably to help this growing global epidemic. We at Nebula want to live in a world where there is no shortage of water. 

 

Sources: WRI; Euronews; National Geographic; Business Insider; United Nations; BBC; Time; Arabian Business; CNN;