Atlantis sits over one of the most studied and actively managed aquifers in the country, which the City draws on for municipal supply.
That makes it the one part of the region where your borehole shares an aquifer with a formal water supply scheme, and abstraction deserves corresponding care.
What Is Under Atlantis
| Formation | Where it sits | What it means for drilling |
|---|---|---|
| Coastal and windblown sand | Across the area, often to considerable depth | Unconsolidated, permeable and productive, with a shallow water table. Wellpoints work; boreholes need screening and a gravel pack. |
| Calcrete and cemented horizons | Within the sand sequence at depth | Harder bands inside otherwise loose ground, which affect drilling and the casing requirement. |
| Basement rock | Well below the sand | Rarely reached or targeted, since the sand aquifer above is more accessible. |
Send your street and what the water is for, and get an itemised quote for Atlantis.
Get a Atlantis Borehole QuoteWhat That Means for Your Borehole
- Availability is not the issue on this coast. Plan around what the water contains and what the ground sustains.
- Coastal salinity is a genuine risk, particularly on shoreline stands and under heavy pumping.
- Sand management is part of the construction, not something to fix downstream with a filter.
Where We Work Around Atlantis
- Atlantis town and the residential sections
- Witzand and the wellfield surrounds
- Atlantis Industrial premises
- Mamre and Pella approaches
- Silwerstroomstrand-side properties
- Smallholdings on the town fringe
- Public facility and school grounds maintenance
What to Watch For Here
This aquifer is actively used and actively managed. The sand aquifer here supports municipal supply, and private abstraction sits alongside that. Operating within a tested sustainable rate is not just good practice for your own borehole, it matters for a shared resource.
Industrial land-use history around the industrial area is a genuine reason to widen the water analysis before the water is used for anything beyond irrigation.
What the Water Is Used For
- Watering established gardens and lawn on domestic stands
- Industrial washdown and process water
- Grounds at schools and community facilities
- Smallholding irrigation and livestock
- Sports field and open space irrigation
- Continuity cover when the mains supply goes down
Wellpoint or Borehole?
Very often sufficient. The deep coastal sand and shallow table are ideal for a point, which covers garden irrigation cheaply. The step up to a borehole makes sense for volume, dry-season dependability, or water that needs a proper sanitary seal above it.
Registration and Abstraction
Boreholes and wellpoints here must be registered with the City of Cape Town. Separately, the National Water Act governs how much you may abstract: reasonable domestic use and small-scale garden watering generally fall under Schedule 1, while larger abstraction may require registration or a water use authorisation from the Department of Water and Sanitation. Requirements change, so confirm your position before drilling.
Related Services
For the drilling process itself, the geology across the wider metro and how a quote is put together, see Borehole Drilling Cape Town.
Borehole Prices in This Area
Drilling is charged per metre, so depth drives the total. The ranges below are framed for local ground conditions and access.
| Item | Indicative range | What moves it locally |
|---|---|---|
| Drilling, per metre | R400 - R900 /m | Deep coastal sand drills quickly, giving some of the lowest per-metre rates in the region. |
| uPVC casing, installed, per metre | R400 - R700 /m | Diameter and class. Weathered-zone thickness is not known until drilling starts. |
| Mobilisation and site establishment | R2,500 - R9,000 | Access and site conditions move this; a site visit settles it before quoting. |
| Water survey | R5,000 - R12,000 | Targets structure rather than depth. Worth most where yield is fracture-dependent. |
| Yield testing | R3,500 - R15,000 | Establishes the sustainable rate that pump selection depends on. |
| Pump, supplied and installed | R15,000 - R45,000 | Greater depth means more head, which means a larger pump and heavier cable. |
| Storage and booster | R12,000 - R35,000 | Needed wherever peak demand exceeds the borehole's sustainable rate. |
| Wellpoint alternative | R6,500 - R10,000 | Where sand depth and a shallow water table allow it, this covers garden irrigation for a fraction of the cost. |
| Typical complete project | R50,000 - R140,000+ | Everything above, excluding treatment, which depends entirely on the water analysis. |
These are indicative ranges, not a quotation. They are compiled from published South African supplier and contractor pricing to give you a starting point for budgeting. They are not our rate card, and no figure here is a commitment.
Treat them as a broad guide only. Published borehole pricing in South Africa varies enormously - different 2026 guides quote per-metre drilling rates for the same province that differ by a factor of three - because depth, geology, access, specification, distance and fuel costs all move the number. Depth in particular is not known until the hole is finished. Figures generally exclude VAT unless noted, and change over time. Only an itemised written quote against your actual site means anything.
Atlantis Borehole FAQs
Can I drill a private borehole in Atlantis?
Subject to registration and the usual requirements, yes. What makes Atlantis different is that the sand aquifer here is actively used and managed as part of municipal supply.
Private abstraction sits alongside that, so operating within a tested sustainable rate matters for the shared resource as well as for your own borehole.
Is Atlantis groundwater good quality?
The sand aquifer is productive, and quality is generally reasonable, but it varies and it should be measured. Near the industrial area, historic land use is a real reason to widen the analysis.
For anything beyond garden irrigation, define what the water is for and test against that specification.
How productive is the aquifer here?
More so than most of the region's ground, which is precisely why it supports a formal supply scheme. Reaching water is generally not the difficulty.
Sustainable rate still needs establishing by testing, particularly for irrigation or industrial volumes, and cumulative abstraction across many users is a genuine consideration.
Does industrial use need a different analysis?
Yes. A domestic drinking water panel answers the wrong question for process water. Define the specification the process requires - hardness, dissolved solids, iron, whatever it is sensitive to - and analyse the raw water against that.
Around the Atlantis industrial area, a broader screen is worth running before the water goes near people or product.
DRILLING IN ATLANTIS?
Send your street and what you need the water for, and get an itemised quote.
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