A practically dry Catalonia has hit the red button of generalized emergency after 40 months (more than three years) of the worst drought that the community has suffered since records exist, more than a century ago (1916).
The emergency will come into force this Friday, when it is published in the Official Gazette of the Generalitat (DOGC).
This is the worst phase stipulated by the Special Drought Plan (PES) and in which the most severe restrictions are applied to industry, agriculture and domestic household consumption.
The emergency will extend to Barcelona, Girona and 200 more municipalities, which will join the 37 in Girona and Tarragona, where it was already in force.
This was announced this Thursday by the president of the Generalitat, Pere Aragonès, in an extraordinary press conference.
The
president
has called on citizens to fight together against drought, as happened with the covid pandemic: “The climate crisis is testing us as in the pandemic,” he added.
In total, almost six million people (almost 80% of the community) who for now must limit their consumption to 200 liters per inhabitant per day, apart from continuing to apply restrictions already in force, such as the prohibition of watering gardens, washing the car if not in specific commercial establishments that use water recirculation or fill swimming pools.
“It is the worst drought ever recorded,” said the
president.
The supply of all these 239 localities in emergency depend on the Generalitat, competent in the management of internal basins, unlike the populations that are fed by the Ebro River (including the city of Tarragona and Lleida), hydrographic units dependent on the Ebro Hydrological Confederation, dependent on the Ministry, and where the situation is better.
More information
What are the water restrictions in the municipalities of Barcelona that are in emergency due to drought?
The reservoirs today stand at 15.8% and the lack of medium-term rain forecasts have trapped the community in the long tunnel with no end in sight and with still uncertain economic and political consequences.
Barcelona and its entire dense metropolitan area will enter this extreme phase of emergency for the first time since in 2007 the then tripartite Government (PSC, ERC and Initiative) was forced to approve a decree stipulating the pre-alert, alert, exceptionality and emergency (today included in the current 2020 Drought Plan), as well as the restrictions to apply in each of these scenarios.
Among them, lowering the pressure of the taps in the municipalities with higher consumption.
The Minister of Climate Action, David Mascort, announced in the joint press conference that he will meet on Monday with the Minister for the Energy Transition, Teresa Ribera.
At that meeting, Mascort explained, a hypothetical transfer of water from other territories will be discussed if it is necessary in the coming months: “The conversations with the ministry are fluid.
We will surely find the formula, if necessary (to take that measure).”
Ministry sources confirm that the meeting, where infrastructure financing will also be discussed, will be only between Mascort and Ribera, without other departments participating.
In December, the Government opened the possibility of bringing water again (as it did in the 2008 drought) by boat before summer if the rains do not arrive.
The announcement revived tension between territories such as the Balearic Islands and Murcia, reluctant to release water from their desalination plants, as this newspaper reported.
According to Mascort, both he and the central Administration would agree that "if water has to be brought, it is not so important where it comes from, but rather the fact that if water is needed, the water will come", he has responded to specific questions about the Balearic Islands and Murcia.
Three staggered phases
The Catalan Executive has designed three staggered phases where almost six million people from the affected municipalities will move in as the severity of the drought progresses.
The emergency has three subphases: emergency I, emergency II and emergency III.
In the first stage, no more than 200 liters per inhabitant per day may be consumed;
a threshold that will drop to 180 liters in the second;
and 160 liters in the third.
The beginning of each scenario will be marked by the level of the reservoirs.
In addition to the measures on human consumption, agriculture will restrict the use of water for irrigation by 80%;
livestock, 50%;
and the industry, 25%.
Nor can new projects be started that require intensive use of water resources, such as farms, urban or tourism plans.
Both swimming pools and sports centers will have to comply with the regulations of each level of the emergency.
In more serious phases, any type of sports center must close the showers.
A large part of the speeches by Aragonès and Mascort to announce the entry into the emergency have been focused on calling on citizens to save across the board, at the same time that they defended the management of the drought in recent months.
“We will overcome the drought and we will do so thanks to collaboration and planning and well-directed investments,” said Aragonès.
Afterwards, Mascort called for calm: “We will not run out of water, but we will have less water,” said the counselor in reference to the community's capacity to produce drinking water through desalination and regeneration plants. (make waste water drinkable).
That is to say, even if the reservoirs can dry up completely, the community could subsist on the water produced through technology.
Sources from the Climate Action Department explain that the weather forecasts continue to be poor and in the short and medium term no rainfall is forecast.
Sanctions
Town councils that exceed the established average volumes face sanctions, as has already happened with the tourist town of Begur or Palau-Saverdera (Girona), fined 54,000 and 19,000 euros, respectively.
The counselor
has said that 100 sanctioning files have been opened against non-compliant municipalities based on the sanctioning regime they approved last year.
The Government thus seeks to pressure local administrations to carry out more exhaustive control of consumption among residents.
For municipalities to classify the infraction and calculate the fine, the impact of the actions on the water context of each area is taken into account.
Thus, actions as everyday as washing the car or watering the garden at home, in Barcelona and surrounding areas, may lead to fines of 30 and 50 euros.
The unusual emergency phase seemed almost unlikely in November 2022, when the first alert for widespread drought was activated in the Ter-Llobregat hydrological system, which supplies Barcelona.
Then, the Government clung to the community's capacity to produce drinking water thanks to the desalination and water regeneration plants (at maximum operation for more than two years) that were deployed during the tripartite to address the historic drought. 2007. The then Minister of Climate Action, Teresa Jordà, insisted in 2022, after declaring the first alert, that the community was much better prepared than in 2007 to face the current situation.
Other voices from the Government insisted then that almost dystopian decisions, such as transporting water by boat from other regions (as happened in 2008), were already things of the past.
But the climate reality has been more stubborn and puts domestic consumption in trouble in a large European and tourist city like Barcelona, now condemned to become a giant laboratory to confront the long droughts that the era of climate change brings with it.
“We will win a future in which we are much more resilient to climate change,” Aragonès emphasized.
Today, February 1, in Barcelona it has reached 17 degrees Celsius.
Boats as a solution, entry of Procicat and environmental criticism
Although the Government has repeatedly assured that ships carrying water shipments are not a solution to the drought, Mascort explained at this Thursday's press conference that these ships will “help” those economic activities that need an essential minimum amount. for its operation in the future of this water crisis.
In fact, he will meet next Monday with the Minister of Ecological Transition, Teresa Ribera, to address the available options.
The counselor has also stated that Procicat, the body that managed the pandemic, will act if the reserves of the reservoirs reach the limit and decisions must be made to avoid further affecting the population.
Furthermore, environmental groups such as Aigua es Vida or Greenpeace have once again criticized the management of the Special Drought Plan after the declaration of emergency.
The platforms, which have gone up to Motjuïc (Barcelona) carrying a banner where one could read “Climate change + bad management = drought”, emphasize that the Generalitat is not taking appropriate measures in relation to tourism, which they point out as one of the areas most demanding of water and as one of the sectors whose consumption figures are not disclosed.
Also, the entities warn in a statement issued this Thursday that the agricultural and livestock model “leaves unusable” up to 57% of the groundwater that could be used in times of drought.
The measures that come into force with emergency I
Luis Velasco
Among the emergency restrictions I due to drought, which the Generalitat approved this Thursday and which will come into force tomorrow, Friday, are:
Homes, economic and commercial activities may not exceed 200 liters of water per day.
Cleaning vehicles outside commercial establishments that have water recirculation systems is prohibited.
Cleaning streets, facades, sewers and urban furniture with drinking water, whether public or private, is prohibited.
Except in cases of accidents, fire, health or road safety risk.
In these situations, cleaning will be carried out with the essential minimum of regenerated or groundwater water.
Although washing shop windows and windows with a bucket and sponge is allowed.
Federated sports fields may only be irrigated during the least hot hours with regenerated or groundwater water.
In addition, they must indicate the origin of the water and implement an additional plan to compensate for the volume of this expense, such as closing the showers.
The total or partial filling of public, private or community swimming pools (including those in hotels) is completely prohibited.
It can only be done partially if they have recirculation systems and to guarantee sanitary quality: covered swimming pools registered in the Generalitat's census of sports facilities that present a compensation plan;
those for therapeutic use in hospitals, residences and special education centers, as well as those of individuals who have a disability certificate stating that they suffer from behavioral disorders.
Salt pools may be filled totally or partially as long as they are not connected to the sanitation networks.
Outdoor pools open all year round for federated sports practice are required to close the showers to compensate for their use.
Ornamental fountains, artificial lakes and other elements for aesthetic use of water may not be filled.
Except for wildlife refuges in danger of extinction or intended for the recovery of native species, which can be filled with the minimum essential amount of regenerated or groundwater water.
Showers and foot cleaning facilities on the beaches are completely prohibited.
Ice rinks and other recreational events, whether public or private (such as foam parties or water games), that use drinking water, are completely prohibited.
The use of water to remove dust and matter suspended in the air is prohibited.
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