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Despite the rapid extension of public service delivery since the end of Apartheid, many rural citizens in South Africa still rely on their own initiatives and infrastructure to access water. They construct, improve, operate and maintain infrastructure of different complexities, from individual wells to complex collectively owned water schemes. While most of these schemes operate without legal recognition, they provide essential services to many households. In this article we will first provide an overview of the growing international body of literature describing self-supply as an alternative pathway for public service delivery. We then take a historical perspective on the role of communities and self-supply in South Africa and describe the emergence of six collectively owned, gravity-fed, piped schemes in Tshakhuma, Limpopo Province. We describe and compare these systems using key characteristics like resource access, investment, construction, operation, maintenance and institutional governance. We further assess their performance with regard to coverage, service level, reliability, governance structure, accountability and water quality. We do so because we are convinced that lessons learned from studying such schemes as locally adapted prototypes have the potential to improve public approaches to service delivery. The described cases show the willingness of community members to engage with service delivery and their ability to provide services in cases where the state has failed. The assessment also highlights problematic aspects of self-supply related to a lack of accountability, technical expertise and the exclusion of disadvantaged community members. By describing and assessing the performance of rural self-supply schemes, we aim to recognize, study and learn from such schemes. We consequently do not conclude this article by providing answers, but by raising some pertinent, policy-relevant questions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study assessed the presence of key requirements for sustainable O&M and rehabilitation of rural small-scale water infrastructure in Makhudutamaga Municipality in South Africa. The study found a significant correlation between the requirements for sustainable O&M and rehabilitation of rural small-scale water infrastructure and continuity of service provision (p < 0.001) by the small-scale water infrastructure as well as functionality (p < 0.001) of the small-scale water infrastructure hardware. The study concludes that the presence of the key requirements varies as a function of social dynamics of communities and the presence of these requirements has an impact on the functionality and continuity of the small-scale water infrastructure hardware. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Large numbers of households and communities will not be connected to the national electricity grid for the foreseeable future due to high cost of transmission and distribution systems to remote communities and the relatively low electricity demand within rural communities. Small-scale hydropower used to play a very important role in the provision of energy to urban and rural areas of South Africa. The national electricity grid, however, expanded and offered cheap, coalgenerated electricity and a large number of hydropower systems were decommissioned. In this study, a feasibility and implementation model was developed to assist in designing and financially evaluating small-scale hydropower (SSHP) plants. The implementation model describes steps to be followed in identifying a technically possible and economically feasible opportunity to develop a SSHP site for rural electrification. The development model was used in designing the Kwa Madiba SSHP plant. The Kwa Madiba SSHP plant was economically evaluated on net present value, internal rate of return, levelised cost of energy, financial payback period and cost/benefit ratio. The outcome of this study proved that it is technically possible to provide SSHP installations for rural electrification in South Africa that are more feasible than local or national electricity grid extensions or even alternative energy sources such as diesel generators. It was concluded that the levelised cost of SSHP projects indicates that the cost of SSHP for low energy generation is high compared to levelised cost of coal-fired power generation. However, the remoteness of SSHP for rural electrification increases the cost of infrastructure to connect remote rural communities to the national electricity grid. This provides a low cost/benefit ratio and renders technically implementable SSHP projects for rural electrification feasible on this basis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]