The EU is alot of money ready - but Pablo Cotarelo finds no pleasure in it. 5.85 billioneuros has been scheduled by 2020 for energy infrastructure projects EU. Thisincludes the 400-kilovolt power line that is built for years by Spain'snortheastern Catalonia region. It should be part of a connection from centralEurope to Morocco.
Cotarelolives in Barcelona. The activists from the environmental organizationEcologists acción sees no point in the major project - at least not for theaffected population. He criticized the planned EU-wide high-performancenetworks for electricity and gas and the non-European "pharaonic projectslike Desertec "that are taken to secure Europe's gas and electricitysupply in attack:" At least for Spain or Southern Europe has no sense inthe crisis is a Europe with low electricity demand, therefore, theinfrastructure must not be enlarged. There is absolutely no need to transportas much power." Cotarelo can call several studies and reports, accordingto which there are more economic motives that drive the giant project - ratherthan the needs of the people or the "logic of technology." The financiallywell-armed power sector, he says, would benefit from big investments andthereby remove more and more of the reality of the needs of the population.
"Thereis almost no one for it," says Albert lap of the protest alliance "Noa la MAT Girona". The new line is called short-MAT, which is Spanish forhigh voltage. In the province of Girona by the same name around town ismobilized again in a number of villages against the MAT, because now the lastsection and a turn-off to be tackled. Several years ago, the further southsection of Sentmenat was built by Bescanó, although there had been a longresistance in different parts of Catalonia. For each of demonstrations severalthousand people came and at a forest occupation, people long entrenched on high-lyingplatforms in the trees and in tunnels.
In theupcoming section of the now privatized power company REE plans to build atleast 70 of the 115 necessary power poles by the end of the year, as theCatalan daily El Punt Avui wrote a few weeks ago. In the first half of 2014,the last masts are available, the current should flow from mid-2015. Every 500meters is one of the racks are available that are up to 55 meters high,according to the newspaper. According to Albert Saus there are, however, up to80 and in one case even 90 meters. With 98 percent of the expropriated landowners to have unity had been achieved, reports El Punt Avui.
Saus isamong those who defend themselves against expropriation. His whole life spentin the village Viladasens the 34-year-old. This is not affected by theconnection to France, but of a turn, which will distribute the current towardsthe coast. But that the MAT is built to their well-being here a lot of peopleinto doubt. The protestations of the regional government, it also go to thelocal security of supply, does not pull in "No a la MAT". The"electricity highway" does not matter if the local infrastructure iscrumbling, says the lap. And anyway, the consumption here, as in all of Spainhad declined because of the years of economic crisis in the high double-digitpercentage range.
There isalso still the village mayor, who reject the MAT - but none of the Catalangovernment party CiU. The were against the MAT when the party was inopposition, says the lap.
Regulations to protect the public notcomplied
TheNo-a-la-MAT movement criticized not only the change of the landscape,environmental degradation and various security problems. She complains alsothat the mayor and other people have achieved with contacts in the CatalanParliament track changes in their favor. "The current route makes littlesense," laments activist. She was longer, crosses twice the highway andeven several times the existing 130-kilovolt line, so saus. "At one houseit goes to 17 meters over, another is 45 meters, and many other less than 100meters - even though the regional government has promised that the line is atleast 100 meters at individual homes and 500 meters to town centers by."
However,these values are not required by law. According Saus states the relevant lawfrom the 1960s, when Spain was still a dictatorship that lines of 400 kilovoltsin just seven meters can be built from a house. "The seven meters are theminimum, so there will be no discharges of moisture," says lap. "No ala MAT Girona" linked in his blog a dozen studies that suggest a healthrisk due to the nearby high-voltage power lines. Participation rights inadjacent France, where the MAT had been laid underground to the pressure ofpopulation have not given it here, is suing the Catalan movement.
From centralism have enough people
Theinternational safeguards Aarhus Convention of civil society to information andparticipation in projects with environmental implications. In its Annex are"power lines" even explicitly mentioned. Spain has the AarhusConvention, although ratified, but not implemented - in contrast to France.Here, EU Commissioner Günther Oettinger had a participation of citizens calledfor, as he recently presented the billion program for the networks.
The EUpromotes the local population rather unpopular major project, the Spanishgovernment is in league with the oligopoly of power companies, the grid companyis privatized and therefore has a vested interest in electricity - no wonder,says Albert Saus that the anti-MAT movement rather decentralized powergeneration especially from renewable energy sources will. For him, there isalso an argument that in Catalonia currently a detachment of Spain is wellrepresented: a new state should be independent of Spain in terms of energy.
The factthat the conflict in Catalonia something particularly speaks to us in Germany,is that we it the other way around can see: So, for example, the Germanindustry can continue to run at full speed after switching off the nuclear andcoal power plants, pipelines will be built through half of Europe, to fetchelectricity and gas from Africa or Spain, while the regions through which thepipes are laid, which not only do not need, but also are the victims - eitherbecause the local population is affected by high voltage power lines or becausethe economy of the whole country suffers from the dominance of Germany.
