This project aims to improve safe, equitable, and resilient access to drinking water in vulnerable communities in Cape Town (South Africa), particularly in informal settlements such as Khayelitsha and Delft, where thousands of people live without formal water and sanitation infrastructure, relying on overcrowded and unreliable community water points. This situation increases health risks, social exclusion, and climate vulnerability.
The project proposes an integrated solution combining decentralized infrastructure and nature-based solutions, including rainwater harvesting and storage systems, safe reuse of treated greywater for non-potable uses, and safe community supply stations. These measures aim to reduce dependency on fragile networks, ensure supply during droughts, and decrease waterborne diseases.
The intervention is structured using the VWBA 2.0 approach to quantify the Volumetric Water Benefits (VWBs) generated, and the WASH Benefits Accounting framework to reflect improvements in health indicators, access equity, climate resilience, and social return. The entire design ensures water additionality, traceability, and alignment with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), enabling impacts to be validated through external audits.
Cape Town is a city at high risk of structural water scarcity and inequality in water access, exacerbated by growing population pressure and the intensification of extreme climate events.
Densely populated communities such as Khayelitsha and Delft rely on precarious networks, often sharing a single supply point among hundreds of people, leading to frequent outages, low pressure, disease accumulation, and social tension.
This situation is explained by the overexploitation of reservoirs supplying the entire city, the proliferation of informal urbanizations without connection to safe networks, lack of maintenance of existing infrastructure, and the effects of climate change reducing the natural recharge of aquifers and reservoirs. This combination has placed Cape Town on the brink of water system collapse, as evidenced during the 2018 “Day Zero” crisis.
The project responds to this situation with a decentralized water resilience approach, bringing supply and treatment solutions directly to communities to reduce dependence on vulnerable systems, increase adaptive capacity, and guarantee the human right to water in a safe, equitable, and sustainable manner.
The project introduces community rainwater harvesting systems equipped with first-flush filtering mechanisms to remove sediments and airborne pollutants before water is stored. This water is collected in elevated 10,000-liter tanks, allowing for efficient gravity-based distribution even when municipal supply is interrupted. Access stations are designed with multiple taps at different heights to ensure universal accessibility (children, the elderly, and people with reduced mobility).
These solutions enable communities to take advantage of rainfall events safely and autonomously, mitigating the effects of frequent outages or low pressure in public networks. This translates into a direct increase in the availability of clean water in the immediate environment.
Complementarily, the project incorporates modular systems for the treatment and reuse of greywater generated in community facilities such as handwashing stations, showers, and laundries. These waters undergo physical and biological processes to ensure quality for non-potable uses such as irrigation of bio-gardens, toilet flushing, or space cleaning. This reduces pressure on potable sources and contributes to the circular water cycle within the settlement.
Additionally, interventions are carried out on existing high-loss infrastructure: leaks are detected using acoustic sensors, defective valves and connections are replaced, and flow meters are installed to record consumption and assess water efficiency at the sector level.
Altogether, these actions are designed to generate quantifiable benefits under the VWBA 2.0 framework by increasing the volume of water captured, saved, or reused, and to improve indicators defined by the WASH BA approach, such as continuous access, reduction of waterborne diseases, and user-perceived safety. All of this is implemented with physical traceability mechanisms (sensors and records), social (community surveys), and environmental (water quality and associated vegetation), ensuring permanent and auditable benefits.
• SDG 1 -No Poverty: by ensuring basic access to drinking water and sanitation in vulnerable communities, the project reduces expenses associated with disease and time lost collecting water, contributing to improved economic well-being.
• SDG 2 – Zero Hunger: irrigation with treated greywater enables the cultivation of community gardens, improving local food security.
• SDG 3 – Good Health and Well-being: reduction of waterborne diseases through access to safe water and improved hygiene practices.
• SDG 6 – Clean Water and Sanitation: direct improvement in access, availability, and water quality through decentralized solutions.
• SDG 8 – Decent Work and Economic Growth: installation, maintenance, and operation of water systems generate local employment and build technical capacity within the community.
• SDG 10 – Reduced Inequalities: improves territorial equity by targeting areas historically excluded from formal water infrastructure, empowering communities.
• SDG 11 – Sustainable Cities and Communities: adaptive, accessible, and resilient infrastructure in informal urban contexts.
• SDG 12 – Responsible Consumption and Production: reuse of greywater and efficient water management reduce environmental impact and promote circular water use.
• SDG 13 – Climate Action: enhances community water resilience against extreme climate events.
• SDG 15 – Life on Land: bio-gardens contribute to urban soil restoration and promote local biodiversity.
• SDG 17 – Partnerships for the Goals: collaborative implementation with local governments, NGOs, and certifying entities, aligning resources and knowledge for greater impact and scalability.
The project will be implemented in four sequential phases that enable comprehensive technical and social deployment, with clear goals, defined control instruments, and validated technologies. Each phase incorporates planning, execution, and monitoring components, ensuring traceability and community participation.
Phase 1: Diagnosis and community participation (months 1–2): This stage includes mapping water risks and WASH gaps through technical visits, interviews, and participatory workshops with the community. Participatory diagnostic tools, vulnerability matrices, and satellite data (TerraPulse/Copernicus) are used to characterize access, quality, and water use conditions. Priority pilot sites are selected based on equity criteria, technical feasibility, and alignment with local needs.
Phase 2: Technical design and procurement (months 3–4): Technical plans are developed for rainwater harvesting systems, greywater treatment, and community distribution. Expected VWBA 2.0 water benefits are calculated using hydrological spreadsheets, volume simulations with historical climate data, and site-specific hydraulic sizing. Equipment specifications are defined for procurement: sensors, civil works materials, and monitoring kits.
Phase 3: Installation and commissioning (months 5–7): Construction and field installation of infrastructure are carried out: collector roofs, UV filters, elevated tanks with overflow valves, infiltration bio-gardens, greywater treatment systems, and community tap stations. Local technicians and community promoters are trained through practical workshops on operation, maintenance, and proper use. All infrastructure is documented through technical sheets and georeferencing.
Phase 4: Monitoring and validation (months 8–12): This phase includes monitoring key indicators: volume captured, volume reused, service continuity, and perceived improvement. Ultrasonic level and flow sensors connected to dataloggers are used, along with laboratory analysis following SANS 241 standards to assess water quality, and statistically based perception surveys. Cross-validation is applied using satellite images (NDVI, soil moisture) and field inspections. Data is systematized in the Aqua Positive platform to ensure traceability, external audit readiness, and certified CAPs generation.
This project aims to sustainably, equitably, and resiliently improve water access in highly vulnerable communities of Cape Town, South Africa, particularly in informal urban areas such as Khayelitsha and Delft. These areas lack formal water and sanitation infrastructure, with thousands of people relying on a few community water points, often overcrowded, intermittent, or non-operational, significantly increasing health risks, inequality, and exposure to extreme climate events.
The proposed solution combines decentralized infrastructure, nature-based systems, and accessible technologies to ensure water availability at the point of use, reduce losses, and promote safe reuse. Rainwater harvesting systems with first-flush filtering, elevated storage tanks, and inclusive distribution stations are implemented. This collected water serves as an alternative source in case of municipal supply interruptions, increasing neighborhood water resilience.
This is complemented by the installation of treatment modules for the safe reuse of greywater from community sinks, showers, and laundries. These waters, treated through physical and biological processes, are used for irrigating bio-gardens, cleaning, and other non-potable uses, integrating a circular water model within the settlement. Existing infrastructure is also reinforced with leak detection technology via acoustic sensors, replacement of defective valves, and digital flow meters, significantly improving system efficiency.
The project is structured using the VWBA 2.0 methodology to quantify Volumetric Water Benefits (VWBs), and the WASH Benefits Accounting approach to measure improvements in public health, continuous access, and community resilience. It also includes physical traceability (sensors and measurements), social (surveys), and environmental (water quality and satellite monitoring), all recorded on the Aqua Positive platform, meeting the principles of additionality, permanence, and verifiability.
The Eerste River basin, where the targeted neighborhoods are located, is part of the Western Cape Water Supply System. Although not listed among the 100 priority basins of the CEO Water Mandate, it presents equivalent conditions of critical water vulnerability and has been classified by South Africa’s Department of Water and Sanitation as high structural risk. The intervention contributes to restoring hydrological balance in an urban region exposed to recurring tensions, such as the “Day Zero” crisis in 2018.
The project is developed in four phases: participatory diagnosis and WASH gap mapping (months 1–2), technical design and material procurement (months 3–4), community construction and installation (months 5–7), and impact monitoring and validation (months 8–12). Throughout the cycle, level and flow sensors are applied, South African SANS 241 standards are used for quality analysis, household surveys are conducted, satellite images (NDVI, moisture) are analyzed, and external audits are carried out, enabling the generation of Positive Water Credits (CAPs) under the Act4Water framework.
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