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Executive overview
Why this report matters
Summary Insight: The City of Cape Town’s Water and Sanitation Directorate is diversifying a water system historically dependent on rain-fed dams. Through the New Water Programme, the City is developing groundwater, water reuse, desalination, and additional surface-water options while renewing aging networks, expanding treatment capacity, reducing water losses, and evaluating alternative delivery models for major infrastructure.
This Our Future Water Intelligence report provides an independent assessment of the Directorate’s water-security strategy, supply diversification, infrastructure renewal, financial resilience, capital delivery, and long-term climate-risk response.
The Cape Town Water Strategy estimated that increasing available supply by more than 300 million litres per day over ten years would require approximately R5.40 billion in 2018 terms, with timing and project composition subject to review.
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Buyer relevance
Who the report is for
- Utility Executives & System Operators: Evaluate surface-water storage, groundwater, water reuse, desalination, treatment capacity, distribution renewal, pressure management, and leakage reduction.
- Regulators & Policymakers: Assess municipal procurement, Section 78 requirements, water-quality safeguards, service-delivery obligations, tariff reform, and equitable access.
- Infrastructure Investors & Financiers: Evaluate capital sequencing, municipal borrowing, external finance, public-private partnership options, project delivery, and long-term infrastructure risk.
03
Decision scope
Questions answered
How is Cape Town diversifying its water supply?
The New Water Programme combines groundwater, advanced water reuse, permanent desalination, and additional surface-water interventions. The report evaluates how these sources complement rain-fed dams and reduce exposure to prolonged drought.
What does the Section 78 process mean for the Faure New Water Scheme?
The Municipal Systems Act process assesses the financial, technical, operational, and institutional requirements for delivering the scheme. The report reviews how the City is evaluating internal delivery, outsourcing, financing, construction, operation, and potential public-private partnership options.
How does network management reduce physical water losses?
District metered areas, pressure management, flow monitoring, leak detection, pipeline replacement, and targeted maintenance improve visibility and control across the distribution network. The report evaluates how these measures protect supply and reduce avoidable operating losses.
How does supply diversification affect tariffs and affordability?
Groundwater, advanced reuse, desalination, network renewal, and treatment expansion require sustained capital and operating expenditure. The report reviews how tariff reform, cost recovery, consumption incentives, municipal finance, and social protection distribute these costs across customers.
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Inside the report
Analytical coverage
Architectures: Diversified water supply portfolio
Examines how the Water and Sanitation Directorate integrates rain-fed dams with groundwater, advanced water reuse, desalination, and additional surface-water options to reduce exposure to rainfall variability.
Enablement: Municipal finance and delivery models
Evaluates how the Water and Sanitation Directorate combines municipal revenues, external finance, grants, reserves, borrowing, and potential public-private partnerships to deliver complex water infrastructure.
Resolution: Asset renewal and network performance
Assesses how the Water and Sanitation Directorate addresses pipeline renewal, treatment constraints, sewer rehabilitation, leakage, pressure management, and infrastructure backlogs across a growing metropolitan system.
Alignment: Tariff reform and equitable access
Reviews how the Water and Sanitation Directorate aligns cost recovery, fixed and volumetric charges, infrastructure investment, consumption incentives, and support for lower-income households.
Capability Building: Advanced treatment and institutional capacity
Explains how the Water and Sanitation Directorate develops the technical, operational, procurement, monitoring, and workforce capabilities required to manage advanced water reuse, desalination, groundwater, and modern network systems.
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Included
What you receive
Complete digital report
The full analysis in a professionally formatted PDF.
Decision-focused analysis
Evidence interpreted around the report’s central strategic and operational questions.
Supporting evidence
Relevant data, documented developments and source material used throughout the assessment.
Analytical frameworks
Structured interpretation of the financial, operational, governance, resilience or resource issues relevant to the report.
Forward priorities
Key developments, risks and issues to monitor following publication.
06
Evidence & method
Built for defensible decisions
The report is grounded in documented public, institutional, regulatory, utility and sector evidence appropriate to its stated scope. Source periods, definitions and reported claims are retained within the complete analysis.
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Lead analyst
Robert C. Brears
Lead Analyst, Our Future Water Intelligence
Robert C. Brears is a water-security specialist and author whose work examines utility transformation, infrastructure, governance, finance and climate resilience for executive and policy audiences.
- Evidence-led water intelligence
- Decision-focused system analysis
- Report-specific treatment of scope and terminology
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Water Utility of the Future: Water and Sanitation Directorate, City of Cape Town
- Format
- Digital report · PDF
- Length
- 18 pages
- Edition
- 2026
- Price
- USD 499
09
Report details
Publication details
- Publisher
- Our Future Water Intelligence
- Report family
- Water Utility Intelligence Report
- Report type
- Water Utility of the Future
- Edition
- 2026
- Format
- Digital report · PDF
- Length
- 18 pages
- Reference
- WATER_UTILITY_OF_THE_FUTURE-WATER-AND-SANITATION-DIRECTORATE-CITY-OF-CAPE-TOWN