Engineers and economists of Catalonia demand to transfer Ebro water to Barcelona to alleviate the current drought and also future episodes of shortages. The water observatory formed by the schools of civil engineers, industrial engineers, agricultural engineers and economists has reached this conclusion after analyzing the possible solutions to the water crisis.
“Despite the success of desalination and regeneration, today we once again have on the table the possibility of loaded ships of water,” he says Carles Conill, president of the water commission of the Col·legi d’Enginyers de Camins, Canals i Ports de Catalunya. “Not everything that should have been done has been done and we need to give resilience and flexibility to the system,” he adds.
Of the many proposals offered by engineers, the most striking, and possibly also the most controversial, is to connect the CAT (Consorci d’Aigües de Tarragona) with the ATL supply system (Ens d’Abastament d’Aigua Ter Llobregat).
65 kilometer pipeline
Today, Tarragona receives water from the Ebro through the mini transfer that connects the Ebro basins (ownership of the CHEthe Ebro Hydrographic Confederation) with the internal basins (ownership of the HERE, the Catalan Water Agency). In total, the current transfer agreement allows up to 4 cubic meters per second to be sent to Tarragona’s supply network. However, the reality is that they are not exceeding 2 m3/s.
Given this situation, the observatory plans to reach 4 m3/s to send water to the Ter-Llobregat system, which supplies the metropolitan area of Barcelona. That is, no more water would be transferred from the Ebro than is already allowed to be transferred. The difference is that, instead of supplying only the Tarragona area, The water would also be used in metropolitan territory.
How would the water move? The engineers’ idea is to build a 65 kilometer pipeline long than link Constanti (Tarragonès) with Olèrdoles (Alt Penedès), which is already part of the Ter-Llobregat system. To do so, they urge the Administration to urgently recover a 2008 project led by Agbar. The pipe continues the route of the AP7 motorway and it could be built in phases, since there is already a pipeline that covers the first 32 kilometers of the road. Along the connection, there would be three pumping stations, as two-thirds of the route would run through the pumping (in the remaining sections, the water would advance due to the force of gravity).
18 months
The commission of the four schools that has studied this infrastructure assures that it could be built within 18 months and that it would cost about 300 million of euros. To meet these deadlines, the project should be put out to tender on an emergency basis and modify the current law which dictates that water from the Consorci d’Aigües de Tarragona (CAT) cannot exceed the geographical limits of this supply entity.
Albert Vilaltaa member of the association, is convinced that the project would facilitate access to water for Barcelona, but warns that should only be used in serious situations: “It would only work in emergency cases and would be another solution to resort to during droughts.”
The reasoning is the following: If in an emergency we talk about bring water by boat from Tarragonawhy not build a pipeline (cheaper than ships) that allows this same solution to be within reach? They insist that this “water corridor“, as they call the infrastructure, would not involve transferring more water from the Ebro than is transferred today.
More connections
In total, some 50 hectometers of water per year. “This would be just one more solution, but in parallel, progress must continue in increasing regeneration and desalination, with the new plants,” he points out. Vilalta.
“Each water crisis It has served to launch new solutions. In 1985, the ministrasvase to Tarragona was a reality. In 2008, the need for desalinate. And this time, we are betting on regeneration, but still we need more“says the engineer. If it went ahead, the connection would be built following environmental criteria and could be reversible.
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The working group that has reached this conclusion also proposes continuing to advance in compliance with the Ter agreements, where it is made clear that less and less Ter water has to be used in Barcelona. However, they do not rule out using Ter water for the system. Fluvià-Mugafurther north, in Alt Empordà: “Without the transfer of the Ter, the development of the Metropolitan area “it would not be the same and without the transfer of the Ebro to Tarragona, the benefited populations would not have been able to grow in economic activity as they have.”
Today, the proposal of new transfers are not on the table (neither the Government nor the Generalitat raise it). For this reason, engineers are committed to taking advantage of a existing mini transfer and interconnect basins to use water from the Ebro that is not being consumed in Tarragona and that can be used to supply Baercelona and surrounding areas. The observatory also opens the debate on the territorial model: “There are too many people living in the same part of Catalonia, which is not sustainable.” With the proposal of interconnecting networks, they intend to generate a consensus that ensures water for the next 30 years.