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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Transferring Water from the Rhone to Barcelona

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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Transferring Water from the Rhone to Barcelona España no sera rica mientras sus rios desemboquen en el mar Julio Alvarez Mendizabal, Spanish premier, 1835 (Spain won't be rich as long as its rivers flow into the sea) EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Transferring water from the Rhone to Barcelona is an exciting project which stirs our imagination twice : the aqueduct Languedoc - Roussillon - Catalogne (LRC) extends our vision of progress, where Mediterranean hydraulics have long had prominent standing, from the Roman bridge on the Gard to the Suez canal ; and it conveys a new solidarity between neighbouring Nations, on what is most essential to life. Yet, reality is as usual less poetic, and such a costly project has to be justified economically as well as environmentally. And of course, before going ahead, one must check whether there are any cheaper and more modest solutions to Barcelona's water scarcity. Clearly the Rhone is a huge Alpine river, and is by far the largest flowing into the Mediterranean ; but there's also a lot of water flowing down from the much closer Pyrenees into the Ebro ; the western part of Catalonia is part of the Ebro basin, and its river Segre, born in France, borders the basin of the Llobregat flowing directly from the mountains down to Barcelona. Why can't the regional water supply of Barcelona area, Aigües Ter Llobregat (ATLL) purchase some water to its nearest neighbour, the Ebro hydrographic Confederation ? The rumour has spread that all Ebro’s water was already allotted, and that it would be impossible to take back the water of the oldest State irrigation project in Spain ; worse, "Zaragoza"1 and even "Madrid" would particularly refuse to give a drop of the precious liquid to the head city of Catalonia. It would then be out of frustration that Barcelona, the largest harbour of the Mediterranean, would buy in France rather than beg in Madrid for a resource able to match its glorious future economic development. The French partners on their side claim that they want to send water for historical solidarity reasons between Languedoc and Catalonia2. From a European perspective, it certainly would be better to found the project on solid economic grounds than on symbolic and ideological arguments which in fact carry outdated rivalries and resentment (Barcelona would be closer to France and Europe than from the rest of Spain). By the way there are also frustrations in France today : the LRC project already has aroused negative reactions from French farmers and some political parties in Languedoc, and once under construction, it might arouse other jealousies around Toulouse, which is closer from Montpellier than Barcelona, and with a much lower pass to go through. In the Toulouse area, there is a dispute about the opportunity to build an extra reservoir in Charlas, so as to increase the low summer flows and indirectly to alleviate the present over-exploitation of water by irrigation. Rhone water would be providential to bypass this dispute. But then later why not serve Genoa in Italy, which is also closer from the Rhone than Barcelona and has water problems ? And in case the Barcelona aqueduct wouldn’t be profitable extend it to Malaga ? Today, all these transfers are technically quite feasible, and even London is closer to the Rhone than Los Angeles is from Colorado. And a century ago, French engineers designed a transfer from Geneva lake to Paris 3. Besides there are 1 Zaragoza is the head city of Aragon, which is almost entirely in the Ebro basin, and which has always claimed its priority on the vital resource, even though the Ebro basin is in fact shared by 8 autonomous regions of Spain. 2 In early Middle Ages, Languedoc was a large part of Southern France including Toulouse, where people used the word ‘oc’ to say yes, while in Northern France they used ‘oil’. It was part of the Wisigothic kingdom, which extended down to Valencia in Spain. Today, people who live in France south of Perpignan largely speak Catalan. 3 After renewed debates from 1890 till 1920, the project was abandoned, because the decision to filter and chlorinate water from all origins, even the far but clean sources, gave a decisive advantage to river intakes next to the city. already many interregional water transfers in operation and other international ones under study in Europe. Upon the report of its Spanish member Juan de Dios Izquierdo Collado, the European Parliament has voted a motion in favour of a systematic study of existing and potential transfers, in the prospect of making a European water grid 4. The LRC link would be the first of a series allowing in the end to transfer "water that floods in the north towards arid lands in the south". Beyond the hydrological ignorance which sustains such a naive and generous idea, there is a clear need for a global reflection on water transfers, and that is what an independent network of researchers on water policy has wished to initiate. Of course environmental impact and other technical studies are being developed by the proponents of the project on both sides of the Perthus pass5, under the supervision of scientific committees. But for us the major issue is not a potential negative impact of the project on the environment on the French or on the Catalan sides. Clearly, sustainability means to consider the demand side of the question. The LRC project is a perfect case to put in practice the Brundtland report on sustainable development : think globally, act locally. Think globally ? Conversely to a common opinion carried by the media, Spain is not a water- poor country by European standards, in particular in per capita water availability. Typical irregularity of river flows is compensated partly by an impressive set of embalses (reservoirs) which have been systematically developed by engineers. However, Spain has long based its economic development on irrigated agriculture, as summarised in the fascinating above epigraph : today around 80% of abstracted water (and a still bigger fraction in the summer) is used by agriculture, and most observers contend that in that particular use it is both massively evaporated and wasted since under-priced. Saving a little bit of irrigation water then liberates a lot for other uses where the economic value of water is far greater. The XXIst century will have to face the issue of unsustainable irrigation, and one must really check the validity of inter-basin transfers if they support an unsustainable development model. Precisely, those forecast in the Spanish National Hydrological Plan (1993) are hotly debated with downstream Portugal, and within Spain between autonomous regions. Even though the Rhone transfer might alleviate the issue, doesn’t it indirectly support an unsustainable model of water use, by postponing the time for a ‘new deal’ between irrigation and other water uses ? Act locally ? But does Barcelona really need to import water from so far ? Can’t the city first organise the local demands management, so as to reach a dynamic equilibrium between supply and demand which would be much more profitable ? From our rough knowledge of demographic and also per capita potable water demand evolution in European cities, it’s quite obvious that the basic water demand forecasts for Barcelona are dubious, and should carefully be checked 6. 4 A report was indeed made, but it was a very partial and lazy job, since it completely forgot to study the many transfer projects which are at a stop for failing to pay for themselves. 5 Société d'Etudes pour l'Aqueduc LRC, SEPA LRC on the French side, and ALRC-ATLL on the Catalan side. SEPA is a subsidiary at 50 % of the Compagnie du Bas-Rhone Languedoc (BRL) and of 9 powerful groups including the 3 Water supply majors, the Caisse des Dépots, Electricité de France, GEC-Alstom, two pipe manufacturers, etc. 6 In fact, I initially was part of the scientific committee set up by the French partner SEPA. I started questioning the project from the documents I had received for the first meeting in October 1997. Since I couldn’t obtain that water demands would be studied by the French party (if they buy the water, do we care), I asked my European colleagues to check them, but I personally did not take a direct part in the review. We then have wished to make a quick and low cost European review of Barcelona’s region socio-economic situation concerning water, and of the possible problem solutions. Thanks to the financial support of the French Direction de l’Eau, we’ve set up an original partnership : a first phase consisted to ex-plain the water demand situation in the Catalan metropolis and in the region. It’s obviously been realised by Catalan and Spanish colleagues, including the French specialist of Iberian peninsula water policies. Then a second phase has gathered several expert analyses from non Spanish and non French European colleagues, who could cross-compare with the evolution of water demands and related issues in their own countries. Of course, despite its size and international character, this LRC aqueduct is by no means unique, and there is a lot of expertise all around Europe ready to be transferred to decision makers. Surprisingly enough, our colleagues all presented cases of abandoned or questioned water transfers, including in Northern Europe. For instance, a project to supply Copenhagen with Swedish water across the Sund has been abandoned ; another transfer from Albania to Puglia across the Otrante canal can’t find its subsidies (both projects are much cheaper than LRC) ; and the projected British national water grid linking Scotland and Wales to the South- East is now subordinated to the first global reduction of supply pipes leaks by water companies.
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