What on earth is a Dunning Charge? Not simple to explain but, let me have a go.
The avaricious Municipality of Cape Town has invented a new charge levied against unsuspecting property owners. If for any reason you have not paid your rates bill, these kind boys and girls will send you a letter threatening to cut your water supply and pre-paid electricity meter. For this there is a charge of some eighty six Rand. But wait there‘s more! Should you as a good citizen pay the arrears, a further “Dunning “charge will be levied against you, which is the same value of eighty six Rand again to lift the threat of the cut off. This too is called a “dunning charge”
Thus at their pleasure you will be levied on your next rates bill for twice eighty six Rand.
All this is in spite of the fact that it is illegal to cut off our pre-paid electricity. What is more these boys and girls say that it does not matter that you may be using less than the free six kilolitre allocation of water they are still entitled to cut off your water! If you us say 5 kilolitres of water in any one month, your water and sewerage bill will be R0.00.
Nowhere in their account structure can you possibly read about a “dunning charge”, so if you want to hear how bad these people have been and their illegal acts you have to call their helpful helpline to ascertain how bad you have been in not paying your rates. Read the full story

Amidst the Chihuahuan Desert, Abe and Josie built a home out of dirt, designed a wind turbine from scrap parts, and raised their newborn without diapers and other conveniences. When their first hand sculpted house went up for sale a couple of years ago in Far West Texas, I was one of many people interested in the real estate deal of a lifetime. But like others who have met this young couple and heard their story, I was inspired to start from scratch, rather than to take out a mortgage, even for their one of a kind, self powered, adobe oasis in the desert. Their website, Vela Creations, is an online, off-grid, informational handbook based on their experience and continued success in the alterlife.

Read further for more of their story and look for an in depth interview with Abe and Josie in the coming weeks.

Abe and Josie have the smarts to survive well in the big city, but they have chosen a different life, a remote life, off grid, debt free, and on their own terms and timeline. What is refreshing about this couple is that they are not rebelling against modern times. On the contrary, they are embracing it, and are in a sense early adopters of a lifestyle that was not possible until very recently. Read the full story

By Bill McKibben

Superheroes indeed! I found them all over South Africa, from Witwatersrand University in Johannesburg to the botanical gardens of Cape Town. This is a country, obviously, that knows a little bit about political movements, so it’s not entirely surprising that people are coming up with dramatic and creative actions: a mass climb of the iconic Table Mountain that juts out above the confluence of the Indian and Atlantic Oceans in Capetown, or simultaneous bike rides in the three main cities, or — the list is long.

I ate breakfast with bishops and other clerics; lunch with biologists; dinner with journalists. South Africa is incredibly diverse and beautiful, which means it will suffer from all the various forms of trouble that climate change brings — drought on the desert edges that now support agriculture, for instance. And because it’s a developing country with an enormous first-world population, it has a real mix of causes and consequences. But more to the point, there seems to be a surplus of people ready to go to work, on Oct. 24 and in the months thereafter. This place has worked miracles before — and everyone we talked to pointed out that it the international movement against apartheid helped pressure the country to change. That’s the kind of pressure we need now!

Grey water is the solution to the problems relating to demand and supply management of water not only in South Africa, but worldwide.

• Supply management of water is water supplied by the municipality to your doorstep. The supply of water is severely stressed in South Africa. In simple terms, we do not have any more places to put any more dams, in any more rivers.

• Demand management is how you or the municipality manages the use of this precious resource.

Grey water is defined as water from baths, showers, hand basins and clothes washing machines or the laundry. Any water from any other source ( toilet water, and from kitchen and bidet’s) is considered black water, and must be allowed to proceed to the sewer, and be treated by some sort of sewerage treatment works.

Grey water is the biggest contributor Read the full story