Cape Town’s dams begin September nearly two-thirds full

After we highlighted the Berg River Dam’s slow roll to 100% capacity in last week’s report, Cape Town’s other supply dams are the star performers this week.

In the City of Cape Town’s latest dam report published on Monday, dam levels are up by 4% over the previous week. The six of the city’s largest puddles are now 65.9% full, holding some 592 000 megalitres of water.

The aforementioned Berg River Dam began the week at 96.7% full, up from 93.2% last Monday. It’s now just a few drops off its 2014 level of 100.5%.

Cape Town’s two other huge feeder dams are also showing marked improvements this week.

Thanks to snow and rain showers, the Voëlvlei Dam gained 6.4% since last Monday. That’s a gain of 10 500 megalitres — more than the total current storage of the Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality’s five dams.

The Cape’s largest dam, the Theewaterskloof, is now 49% full, gaining 3.4% within the past week.

Cape Town’s Voelvlei Dam gained more water this week than the Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality’s five dams hold in total

The Wemmershoek and Steenbras Lower dams gained too bagging 3.1% and 7.8%, respectively.

Only the Steenbras Upper Dam declined this week, but it remains 100.8% full regardless.

The healthier levels are by no means an indicator that the drought is completely over though. And although rain has fallen throughout the winter months, rain gauges across the province are missing their long-term averages.

Even the Voëlvlei Dam received some 17mm less last month than it usually does. (A more extensive look at the rainfall figures since May is coming to Memeburn later this week.)

Water consumption too is higher than last week, topping out at 531-million litres per day, the City of Cape Town reveals.

At least September is off to a damp start. More rain is forecast for the rest of the week, as a cold front arrives in the city on Tuesday.

Feature image: Linus Nylund via Unsplash