# Is anyone paying attention to Cape Town? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [February 7, 2018, 3:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-anyone-paying-attention-to-cape-town/808349 "2018-02-07T03:13:37Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2018, 8:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-anyone-paying-attention-to-cape-town/808349/21 "2018-02-14T08:38:43Z")
> [@GreenWyvern](#): > > So if it runs at 450W for 24 hours, it uses 10.8 kWh to produce 30l of water. > > Now, I don’t have any figures for how much water is withdrawn from the Cape Town water supply to generate 10 kWh, but it will be a _lot_ more than 30l. > > Your machine (which is a pretty expensive investment in the first place) actually uses far more water resources than it condenses from the air. That’s 30l from ~10 hours a day, I don’t run it continuously. Too noisy at night, for one. And no, the only Cape Town electricity generation is sea-cooled nuclear, all the rest of our electricity comes from elsewhere in the country (1000s of km away), so negligible water is being withdrawn from the local supply to generate my electricity. Also, the machine will soon be running off PV solar, so even that is covered. And the issue isn’t whether it’s _efficient_, I knew it to be dreadfully inefficient. The issue is whether it provides sufficient clean, ready-to-drink water for my family’s survival. And it does that. ---
**Author:** ![SamuelA](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c77e96/32.png) [@SamuelA](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SamuelA)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2018, 8:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-anyone-paying-attention-to-cape-town/808349/22 "2018-02-14T08:42:23Z")
> [@GreenWyvern](#): > > So if it runs at 450W for 24 hours, it uses 10.8 kWh to produce 30l of water. > > Now, I don’t have any figures for how much water is withdrawn from the Cape Town water supply to generate 10 kWh, but it will be a _lot_ more than 30l. Umm, how do power plants use up water? If they use it for coolant, the hot water gets pumped back into the river it came from, so there’s no net change. Hydroelectric dams don’t function during water shortages. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2018, 8:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-anyone-paying-attention-to-cape-town/808349/23 "2018-02-14T08:44:30Z")
Oh, yes, there’s also local wind generation, but that’s not a large water draw, either. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2018, 8:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-anyone-paying-attention-to-cape-town/808349/24 "2018-02-14T08:47:31Z")
> [@SamuelA](#): > > Umm, how do power plants use up water? If they use it for coolant, the hot water gets pumped back into the river it came from, so there’s no net change. No, they do use [quite a lot of water](https://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Water_consumption_from_coal_plants) (quite a bit just evaporates). But all our coal-fired plants are nowhere near the drought-hit parts of the country. ---
**Author:** ![Greg\_Charles](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/839c29/32.png) [@Greg\_Charles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Greg_Charles)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2018, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-anyone-paying-attention-to-cape-town/808349/25 "2018-02-14T15:35:40Z")
How is Kirstenbosch Garden faring? I visited Cape Town in 2002 and loved those gardens. I hope the drought isn’t doing them irreparable harm. Cape Town is one of my favorite cities of all the places I’ve visited, so I’m definitely following this story closely. ---
**Author:** ![WilyQuixote](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/f9ae1b/32.png) [@WilyQuixote](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WilyQuixote)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2018, 4:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-anyone-paying-attention-to-cape-town/808349/26 "2018-02-14T16:59:30Z")
> [@Greg\_Charles](#): > > How is Kirstenbosch Garden faring? I visited Cape Town in 2002 and loved those gardens. I hope the drought isn’t doing them irreparable harm. Cape Town is one of my favorite cities of all the places I’ve visited, so I’m definitely following this story closely. Non municipal and non potable water is used. > **[Kirstenbosch - SANBI](https://www.sanbi.org/gardens/kirstenbosch/)** > > Kirstenbosch National Botanical Garden is acclaimed as one of the great botanic gardens of the world. Kirstenbosch is located on the eastern slopes of Table Mountain, which typically receives above average rainfall. (CT will average about 788mm a year, but that area can receive up to 2000mm in a year.) ---
**Author:** ![GreenWyvern](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/greenwyvern/32/2834_2.png) [@GreenWyvern](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GreenWyvern)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2018, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-anyone-paying-attention-to-cape-town/808349/27 "2018-02-14T17:33:18Z")
A good article yesterday in The Atlantic by an American journalist: [Big-City Life on Very Little Water](https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2018/02/big-city-life-on-very-little-water/553151/) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-anyone-paying-attention-to-cape-town/808349.md?page=1)