The City of Cape Town has successfully reapplied for an environmental-impact assessment (EIA) for its routine stormwater management activities following changes in national legislation; however, this time, the city gained citywide authorisation.
The City of Cape Town originally obtained its authorisation in 2000 under the Environment Conservation Act, No. 73 of 1989, from the Department of Environmental Affairs and Development Planning.
“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 the City of Cape Town’s entire surface stormwater system,” black-owned engineering firm GIBB, which had assisted the city in obtaining the authorisation, said on Monday.
The authorisation, which was obtained in February, covered a number of stormwater maintenance activities across a 2 467 km2 region, explained GIBB associate environmental scientist Walter Fyvie.
The company had also assisted in the development of a comprehensive environmental management programme that dealt with all the proposed maintenance activities, indicating key do’s and don’ts that needed to be considered, with a template developed for maintenance management plans.