The reservoirs in the internal basins of Catalonia are currently at 17.7% of their capacity. The short-term weather forecasts are not promising, so the Generalitat assumes that the Ter-Llobregat system will reach 16%, at which point it will have to activate the emergency phase. If nothing changes, I will be in January. The Government has been preparing for this for months and in this sense it has established measures, added to those already stipulated in the Sequera Special Plan, created in 2020, to preserve the water supply as much as possible and delay this entry in January of the emergency phase. They will mainly affect tourism, industry and livestock, but environmental flows in the Muga, Ter and Llobregat rivers will also be reduced.
The initiatives will be effective as soon as the emergency phase is activated. They are complementary measures that will try to partially alleviate the 37 months that Catalonia has accumulated with a below-average rainfall regime. The Generalitat has been appearing for days on Tuesdays, after the meeting of the Executive Council, accompanied by the motto "Water does not fall from the sky." The councilor of Ació Climàtica, David Mascort, has been in charge of reporting on the new restrictions that will be established in the sectors of tourism, intensive livestock farming, urban planning and industrial uses. The objective is “not to increase the demand for water in the current context of drought.”
Thus, with regard to tourism and industry, the Generalitat will declare the temporary incompatibility, while the state of emergency lasts, of the growth of projects or the beginning of activities, which to be developed with guarantees require a significant use of water, in tourism, industrial, services, commercial and agribusiness sectors. For the urban planning sector, the Catalan Executive directly warns of the “temporary incompatibility of new urban planning”, without specifying any amount of water use. To give an example of political overtones, which strains the PSC with ERC among others, the Hard Rock would be unviable if the project is approved during a state of emergency. In any case, Mascort recalled that the Hard Rock is within the framework of a water basin that is on pre-alert and that "it will soon be in a normal situation."
Of course, the procedures for any tourist, industrial or livestock project can continue.
With regard to livestock, authorizations for the entry of animals will not be issued for new livestock farms or for the expansion of existing ones. Likewise, “the suspension of the opening of new farms or the expansion of existing ones will be decreed, as long as the availability of water is not guaranteed to guarantee animal welfare.”
In addition to these measures, the Generalitat also proposes other initiatives. They have to do with the reduction of environmental flows in the Llobregat, Ter and Muga rivers. The calculation is that with this decrease, 4.5 hm3 per month will be preserved in the reservoirs and the rate of decline will thus be reduced by almost half. According to the Government, the slowdown in the loss of reserves would delay the exhaustion of the Ter-Llobregat system by 136 days. And as for Darnius Boadella, the depletion of the reservoir would be delayed by 240 days, waiting for rains in the spring and autumn of 2024.
In any case, new minimum flows are proposed in three sections: of the Llobregat river, in Sant Joan Despí, a flow of 250 liters per second; in the Ter from El Pasteral to its mouth, it would be 600 liters per second, and the Muga, from Pont de Molins to the sea, a flow rate of 40 liters per second would be set.
The Generalitat adds other measures, Mascort explained. Of less impact, but which has been considered important, such as allowing trees located in public spaces to be watered to avoid water stress, which is related to the fall of trees in recent months and which has on occasion caused human victims. Likewise, it is planned to allow irrigation for federated sports and the filling of swimming pools for public and sports use, "as long as a reduction in consumption is guaranteed through the closure of the showers in the locker rooms, in order to guarantee access to sports." to children and young people.”
They will be complementary measures to a Sequera Special Plan that already contemplates measures such as reducing the water supply from 210 liters per inhabitant per day to 200 liters in emergency phase one; 180 liters in emergency two, and 160 liters in emergency three, as well as reducing the supply of water in agriculture to 80%, in livestock uses up to 50%, and industrial and recreational uses to 25%.
