“Large flow transfers are no longer the solution, we must take advantage of every drop of water”

Carlos Arrazola smiles when he remembers the date of his appointment as president of the Ebro Hydrographic Confederation (CHE). “It was December 28, the day of the Holy Innocents.” Now about to complete his first quarter at the helm, the new head of this organization, which regulates a basin that bathes nine autonomous communities in Spain, has experienced a storm with river flooding included and at the same time drought. The baptism of this Chemistry graduate, with 20 years of experience in “the house”, the last four as Water Commissioner, has not been deprived of anything.

“All extreme phenomena end up being unpredictable because you cannot react too far in advance and the important thing is their management.” “Floods – he says due to the last flood of the Ebro on March 2 – happen faster than droughts, which last longer, but both are worrying situations.” Arrazola replaces Dolores Pascual – appointed general director of MÍTICO Water – and reports directly to the same ministry of Teresa Ribera, that of Ecological Transition and the Demographic Challenge of the Government of Spain. And this official who has previously worked in private companies is beginning to know about transitions. "The CHE is about to turn 100 years old, we were the first basin organization created in Spain in 1926 and its example - he emphasizes - has been exported to many other places." And he talks about the changes that water management has undergone in the last 20 years to reach a conclusion: “Large flow transfers are no longer the solution and the challenge now is to take advantage of much more—not every liter—but every water drop".

And the message is for sailors, or for irrigators, because just this month the irrigation campaign has begun in many parts of the Ebro basin, and in a somewhat paradoxical situation. On the left bank, the swamps are overflowing due to the recent rains - those in Álava, Navarra, La Rioja and Aragón are more than 90% full, such as the Yesa reservoir, on the Aragón river (91%) and Mediano, on the Cinca river ( 99%) —and even some are already venting about this wet Easter to make room if the thaw comes. Meanwhile, on the right bank they remain in a delicate situation.

The Sau reservoir, at less than 5% of its capacity, in a photo from December 2023. Albert García

The Ebro reservoir, for example, which is at the headwaters (Cantabria and Castilla y León) and serves to supply the uses of the Ebro Axis, in La Rioja, Navarra and Aragón, is at 39.5% compared to what is usual on these dates. would be to find it above 50%.

“We have the left bank overflowing, and on the right bank what we have is the hope that it can still recover with the rains,” says Arrazola while not ruling out that restrictions may have to be applied. In the nine communities bathed by the Ebro, Catalonia is the one that worries the most, especially in the Segre basin, although right now and thanks to this rainy Easter, small reservoirs like Oliana have reached almost 70% full. However, the largest, Rialb, is still at 33% when the average for the last five years reached 50%.

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Even so, this organization does not contemplate transfers. The specter of transfers periodically stirs up from the territories experiencing shortages, but Arrazola, who is technical and not political, flees from this dimension of the problem. “These issues transcend us because they require a decision at the State level, it is the Government that has the responsibility to decide,” although he does not shy away from getting wet and points out that in the solution being considered in Catalonia, seawater desalination takes precedence, because the ministersvase —although “it is being used”—, “by itself it will not be able to solve the problem because its concession is 94 cubic hectometers when only 80% are usually used for that objective, to supply the municipalities of Tarragona. ”.

It is more blunt about another request from the Catalan Government to manage the basin as it passes through the territory. "I hope that the basin unity is not broken, it is very positive in management and throughout the history of the Confederation, it is what has allowed us to help the territories to develop, and also to face drought, maintaining, for For example, the ecological flows in the Ebro Axis.” It specifically refers to the ecological flow that is key to the survival of the Ebro Delta, declared a natural park, and which last year faced an unprecedented drought that forced supplies for crops such as rice to be reduced by 50%. “In the Delta,” he predicts, “we hope that this situation will not be repeated.”

For all this, with a geography of such variable needs without leaving the same basin, Arrazola aims to finish the pending hydraulic works and digitize the institution to be more efficient. “If we make better use of water, and produce the same thing with less, we are in a better position to face all the extreme phenomena that we suffer and that may occur.” He does not believe, on the other hand, that there is a need for more reservoirs, but rather to finish those that are already in place. In the Ebro Hydrological Plan valid until 2027, five works are planned, four of them in Aragon. The days when environmental and social damage did not count are over. “Now,” he says, “if the benefits of a work do not compensate for this, we have a problem and society does not advance.”

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