Pretoria - The City of Tshwane is set to throw significant financial muscle into building and refurbishing water treatment plants and electricity substations.
The metro is prioritising the electricity and water infrastructure following serious interruptions that inconvenienced residents and businesses in the previous financial year.
This is according to mayor Randall Williams, who yesterday announced that the City would move with the times and embrace the full opportunities provided by new technology and data solutions to build a data-driven service delivery.
He was delivering the first State of the Capital Address of the current local government term.
Williams said it was no secret that Tshwane’s electrical infrastructure had aged and become vulnerable to catching fire easily, and breaking down regularly.
He said the City announced the delivery on the commitment made at the last State of the Capital Address, when it launched a R134 million Wapadrand substation refurbishment project.
He said plans were at an advanced state for the Mooikloof substation refurbishment. The main contractor for the project had been appointed and the site would be handed over before the end of June. They had also prioritised upgrades and refurbishment that the Pyramid, Kentron and Rosslyn substations needed.
Another key electrical infrastructure development was the Wildebees infeed substation. The City, together with Eskom, is facilitating the construction of a new 250MVA infeed substation in the eastern parts of Tshwane.
The infeed substation will cater for future developments as well as alleviate the load from the existing Njala infeed substation. The budgeting quotation process has been finalised and the City is working to finalise the specifications of the new infeed substation.
Williams said the City plans to commission a new 40MVA substation later this year, the proposed Kosmosdal A substation, to supplement the existing 120MVA Kosmosdal B substation, to support data centres in the Kosmosdal area.
The City also lodged an application for a 300MVA new infeed substation in the Kosmosdal area to support the data centre load requirements in the area.
He said they were also engaging Eskom on the development of the Refilwe substation in region 5 along with additional plans to increase electricity capacity in Rethabiseng in region 7, where they are also conducting a Bronkhorstspruit substation upgrade project.
The project will upgrade the existing substation from 20MVA to 80MVA capacity. Work started in October 2019 and is expected to be completed later this year.
The Soshanguve substation in region 1 is also being upgraded from 20MVA to 80MVA capacity. Work on this project started in July 2020 and is expected to be completed in this calendar year.
"All these projects reaffirm our commitment to prioritise, refurbish and maintain our critical infrastructure to enable economic growth in Tshwane.
“We cannot encourage development and investment in our City without supplying the needed infrastructure to support it. This is an investment for the future," said Williams, who ignored noise from ANC and EFF councillors.
In relation to water and sanitation, Williams said the City was taking the issue of water quality in Hammanskraal very seriously.
"As announced in the previous State of the Capital Address, the City took a decision to tackle the problem at source by embarking on a project to expand and upgrade the Rooiwal Wastewater Treatment Works. Rooiwaal is overloaded and requires expansion and upgrading to create the additional required treatment capacity.
“So far, the City is making progress with phase 1 of the project, which is valued at R325m. The project commenced in February 2020 and construction is currently under way. Phase 1 will create an additional 10 megalitres per day treatment capacity, which will improve the operations at the plant and the treated effluent that is discharged into the Apies River.
“Phase 2 has been accelerated and the City, during the recently approved budget adjustment, has allocated the budget to appoint a consultant to begin the design specification for phase 2 during this financial year. Phase 2 will include the construction of a new 80 megalitres-per-day treatment capacity and, once complete, this will resolve the water quality problem permanently.”
He said this project required an estimated R2.6 billion and the City was engaging the Department of Water and Sanitation over a partnership. A partnership would ensure the farming and Hammanskraal communities received potable water and this would unlock much-needed capacity for development in the area.
The City had also earmarked the plants in Sunderland Ridge, Klipgat and Ekangala to be prioritised.
"The City is also working to address the issue of non-revenue water losses. This is water that is pumped into our water network and then it gets lost or unaccounted for due to a variety of reasons, such as water leaks or pipe bursts.”
This problem had a negative impact on revenue collection, To address this, the City had partnered with the Development Bank of Southern Africa on a pilot project that was designed to address non-revenue water losses.
“This pilot project is based on the feasibility study and is in progress in the region 5 areas of Refilwe, Cullinan and Rayton. We have also partnered with the City of Aarhus from Denmark to find the best solutions in managing water losses. Overall, in the current financial year so far, we have invested R180m on water demand and water loss projects, with over 14km of old asbestos and cement water pipes replaced in the process.”
In the current financial year, Tshwane had cleaned 8 311 stormwater kerb inlets, rehabilitated four sinkholes, maintained 1 251 traffic signs and repainted 136km of roads at a cost of R68m, he said.
Despite unusually high rains, 77 million square metres of grass was cut and the City was working towards reaching acceptable illumination in its 239 886 street lights and 1 805 high-mast lights.
Progress had been made at the Centurion Lake, where levels of silt and sand that had accumulated over the years were reduced to improve the flow of the river.
The #TshwaneYaTima campaign aimed at defaulting ratepayers helped the City to collect more than R700m in a short period of time, and the City was maintaining the momentum.
Williams said he was proud to announce that GCR Ratings, one of the City’s official credit rating agencies, had upgraded the City credit rating to CCC+(za) as an issuer of long-dated debt and to CA (za) as an issuer of short-term paper.
Through the expanded public works programme, as of February, the City had created 11 725 work opportunities and was committed to its goal of creating 17 975 such opportunities.
The City delivered the A Re Yeng Line 2B bus service in September 2021, for which there had been rapid uptake and usage of the line. Another planned project is the construction of Line 2B for Lynnwood Road, expected to commence in the next financial year and to take 18 months to complete.
There are also plans to extend Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) services to Mamelodi from Menlyn to operations in 2023.
As part of formalising informal settlements, so far 11 000 households have been provided with permanent stands, with plans for phased-in services and the upgrading of the areas. The City recorded 4 102 new title deeds registrations.
It has seen 20 of its clinics achieve platinum status, three achieve gold status, and one achieve silver status after the yearly assessment by district, provincial and national teams.
Reacting to the speech, ANC leader in council Frans Boshielo said the party was disappointed that Williams had spent three paragraphs on job creation, but failed to say anything about supporting small business and informal traders, who play an important role in the city’s economy.
“When it comes to the refurbishment of electricity substations, although they are a critical need, they are biased towards the affluent areas. It’s not the same for those supporting black communities. There are houses in Nellmapius that need electricity, but he said nothing.”
EFF leader Obakeng Ramabodu said Williams and the DA-led coalition had spoken about 11 000 jobs they had created through the expanded public works programme but that was a poverty-alleviating programme from the national government, and nothing to brag about.
“We gave them two practical things they can do, such as insourcing workers like security guards, cleaners and gardeners. We told them they can also use the Tshwane corridors as part of the industrialisation in the city.
“We have industrial areas like Babelegi, Laudium and Ga-Rankuwa. Those factories are there and not utilised. Why do they not get investors and open those factories and create sustainable employment?”
Pretoria News