Environmental Consultant appointed to get public insights on Atlantic Seaboard Marine Outfalls

14 June 2023

The Minister of Fisheries, Forestry and Environment is currently considering appeals to her Department’s granting of permits for the three marine outfalls in the City of Cape Town. Because the Minister is only deciding the appeal eight years after public participation was conducted, the Minister has determined that the City should collate fresh public inputs to enable her to decide the merits of the appeal. The City welcomes the opportunity to do this, and has already briefed consultants to undertake the public comment process. Read more below:

From 1 June – 10 July 2015, the City placed an advert in community newspapers, inviting public comment on the City’s application for a coastal waters discharge permit at Hout Bay, Camps Bay and Green Point in line with the Integrated Coastal Management Act (ICMA). 

As a result of full compliance, the permit for Hout Bay was successfully issued in 2019, whilst the permits for Green Point and Camps Bay followed in 2022. 

Since the initial public participation, seven major studies have been undertaken by different marine science experts. These studies included bacterial samples, toxicity samples, mussel growth monitoring, animal tissue samples, preliminary biodiversity surveys, chemicals of emerging concern (CEC) studies, dissolved oxygen and detailed numerical modelling.

An expert summary report on this research concluded that “the marine outfalls are meeting their design objectives in reducing potential deleterious ecological and/or human health effects of discharged effluent by taking advantage of increased effluent dilution offered by deep water”.

This research has been published on the City’s website and shared with key stakeholders over time, and will now be of benefit to refreshed public participation on the outfalls. 

The City has further commissioned a study that will determine the feasibility and costing of various higher level pre-treatment interventions at the outfalls. The draft scoping report for this study is anticipated to be complete by 30 June 2023. Further community engagements are planned for later this year on the way forward regarding outfalls once the City has had an opportunity to consider the outcome of the study.

In the interim, the City will announce the logistics for public engagement regarding the discharge permits in due course.

Published by:
City of Cape Town, Media Office