from the desk of DWS….

Dear Colleagues,

The Department of Water and Sanitation published Proposed Regulations for Unconventional Gas for public comment on 07 May 2021 in Government Gazette Notice 44545 of 07 May 2021. The purpose of these regulations is to protect the water resource so as to avoid and minimize detrimental and cumulative impacts on the water resource by the controlled activity as declared (see attached for the Declaration of the activities). The “controlled activity” is as defined in the Government Gazette No. 39299, Notice 999 of 2015 in terms of section 38 of the National Water Act (1998) in respect of the exploration and production of onshore naturally occurring hydrocarbons that requires stimulation, including hydraulic fracturing and underground gasification, to extract, and any activity incidental thereto that may impact detrimentally on the water resource

Important stakeholder engagement sessions as part of the project development of the regulations for unconventional gas activities have been held. The project team has sought to engage with important external stakeholders, to discuss pertinent issues and provide the public and institutions with an opportunity to engage the Department on the proposed regulations and provide additional comments which may not have been provided during the official gazetted commenting period. The Department is accepting any additional comment until 15 December 2021 at unconventionalgas@dws.gov.za

The meetings have been recorded for those that did not know about them or could not make it due to short notice on the proposed engagement and these will be shared with all.

Meeting Presentations
Minimum Information Requirements 
Proposed Regilations  .

For any questions or clarity with regards to the project and regulations, kindly contact Ms Nosie Mazwi at mazwir@dws.gov.za or 012 336 7554.

Kind regards
Chief Directorate: Water Use Compliance Monitoring and Enforcement