After opening a hundred sanctioning files against municipalities that fail to comply with the limits on water supplies, the Generalitat of Catalonia has begun to notify the first sanctions for excessive water consumption in industry, the sector along with livestock and agriculture with greater consumption restrictions due to the extreme drought.
At the moment, the Catalan Water Agency (ACA) has opened “about twenty” administrative files to different companies, sources from the highest body in water management tell EL PAÍS.
The Government, however, avoids, as it already does with the municipalities, giving more information about the signatures on file because the sanctioning process has not concluded (the files are reviewable) and it wants to avoid pointing them out.
The director of the ACA, Samuel Reyes, announced the decision to begin sanctioning non-compliant industrial companies on September 19 during a meeting of the interdepartmental drought commission, where the most important measures are taken against water scarcity and in those involving the
president
of the Generalitat, Pere Aragonès, and the councilors of Acció Climática (David Mascort), Interior (Joan Ignasi Elena), Health (Manel Balcells), Economy (Natalia Mas) and Business (Roger Torrent).
Sources familiar with these meetings explain that Reyes notified the hard core of the Government that it was “necessary” to sanction industrial companies that were not “complying” with the provisions included in the Special Drought Plan (PES).
In the emergency phase, declared on February 2 and the most serious stipulated by the PES, the industry is obliged to reduce consumption of the water concessions granted to them by the Catalan Executive by 25%.
In the previous phase, in force when Reyes informed the Generalitat that sanctions were going to begin to be notified, the established restriction was 15%.
The amount of sanctions for companies, as in the case of municipalities, will vary depending on the water consumed up to a maximum of 150,000 euros for the most serious non-compliance.
The penalty is determined in each case by calculating the excess cubic meters consumed (in the case of emergency an amount of 0.60 euros is applied for each extra cubic meter), stated in the anti-drought decree approved by the Government in February 2023, now a year ago.
Based on this regulation, some town councils that have exceeded the established average volumes have already been fined, such as the tourist town of Begur or Palau-Saverdera (Girona), with 54,000 and 19,000 euros, respectively.
Individuals have also been fined, such as a resident of Esponellà (Girona), fined 3,000 euros for using 56 times more water than the municipality's average.
A large consumer is any activity that uses more than 7,000 cubic meters of water per year and usually has concessions granted by the competent hydraulic Administration.
Until now, however, no fines had been imposed on any large company in the industrial sector, the economic muscle of the community along with tourism.
The Generalitat seeks, after warning about the serious non-compliance of some municipalities, to also put the focus on the consumption responsibilities of a sector that has also been asked to make a great effort in the face of the worst drought that has ever hit the community since they existed. records, more than a century ago.
The lack of data on consumption in the industrial sector has been precisely one of the main complaints of social movements since the first water restrictions began to be applied two years ago.
In a recent forum published in EL PAÍS, the spokesperson for the Aigua és Vida platform, Dante Maschio, wrote: “We do not understand how a Public Administration in the era of digitalization does not have on the agenda the consumption of the water concessions that grants.
"We do not understand how information as essential as the consumption of large economic activities is not publicly accessible."
The reservoirs in the Internal basins of Catalonia are below 16% and the Government has already announced that it will use ships with desalinated water from Sagunto (Valencia) to guarantee the drinking supply in Barcelona this summer.
The employers: "We are not aware"
Luis Velasco
Sources from the employers' associations of Catalonia, Foment del Treball and Pimec (Small and medium-sized companies in Catalonia), have explained to this newspaper that they have not yet received the sanctioning files for exceeding the water consumption limit.
“This Monday they met with the Generalitat for the plenary session in Parliament next week, but we do not know if they have put sanctions on the table,” Foment del Treball sources detail, who point out that none of the associated companies have contacted for advice.
From Pimec they follow the same line: "We are not aware that our associates have received a sanction notification," they say.
Between both employers' associations, they represent more than 230,000 Catalan companies, which account for more than 75% of the community's GDP.
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