Company Announcement - GIBB, South Africa’s leading black-owned engineering firm, has been assisting the City of Cape Town with applying for authorisation for their routine stormwater management activities in terms of the National Environmental Management Act (107 of 1998). The project has involved an application for authorisation in terms of the latest Environmental Impact Assessment Regulations, and sought to authorise a number of routine stormwater maintenance activities.

The CCT is responsible for undertaking the routine management and maintenance of Cape Town’s numerous elements of the surface stormwater such as rivers, canals, vleis, wetlands, estuaries and constructed stormwater systems in an effort to manage flood risk, ensure public safety, and prevent or minimise infrastructure damage. The maintenance activities typically involve fairly routine, often repetitive maintenance and minor construction works, such as vegetation management, erosion control, sediment management, litter and debris removal, and construction and maintenance of minor infrastructure such as headwalls and small culverts. 

Maintenance of larger infrastructure such as weirs is also undertaken as is the maintenance of small foot bridges and boardwalks. Many of these activities often also realise positive ecological impacts by promoting habitat and biotic diversity. 

Some of these activities trigger the EIA Regulations which, in the Western Cape, require authorisation by the Department of Environmental Affairs and Development Planning.

The DEA&DP had advised the CCT that due to changes in national legislation, their existing authorisation, obtained in 2000 under the Environment Conservation Act (Act No. 73 of 1989), needed to be re-applied for in terms of the current NEMA, and its associated EIA Regulations.  “A unique component of this project was that the EIA Application was not applied for under the premise of gaining rights to one specific area, but rather across CCT’s entire surface stormwater system. As far as we know, this is the first case of a municipality obtaining city wide authorisation in terms of NEMA for a number of stormwater maintenance activities applicable throughout the municipality’s jurisdictional area (approximately 2 467 km2). Authorisation was obtained in February this year,” states Walter Fyvie, Associate Environmental Scientist at GIBB.

Candice Haskins, an Aquatic Ecologist in the Stormwater & Sustainability Branch,  Transport for Cape Town said “This complex project was both challenging and rewarding and will prove beneficial to the City by ensuring that it practises due environmental diligence in its stormwater maintenance operations. The technical documentation compiled during the project encapsulates many decades of institutional knowledge and technical expertise – a valuable resource preserving and supporting the municipality’s stormwater management capacity into the future.” 

Whilst some components of the city’s stormwater management system comprise engineered infrastructure and man-made aquatic features, numerous natural features such as rivers and wetlands also form part of the system. Many are moderately or substantially altered from their natural condition, but nonetheless they form a key part of the stormwater system, and hence they need to be maintained.  

“In Cape Town, there are over 7 000 natural, semi-natural and artificial wetlands, and 1 200 km of rivers and streams. The only way that an assessment of this magnitude could be managed was by using GIS analysis of existing databases to group watercourses according to type and ecological sensitivity. From there we defined conditions and limitations for the different maintenance activities in different watercourse types,” shares Fyvie. 

“But there has been more to the project than just pursuing authorisation. Together with the CCT, we developed a comprehensive environmental management programme (EMP) that addressed all the proposed maintenance activities, indicating key ‘do’s and don’ts’ that need to be considered. A template was also developed for Maintenance Management Plans (MMPs) which the CCT will use to develop MMPs for all waterbodies in its jurisdictional area. The MMPs form practical working documents which will be issued to all maintenance team and contractors working in the CCT to ensure maintenance is conducted correctly and are required to be submitted to DEA&DP in fulfilment of the conditions of the authorisation,” concludes Fyvie.