The study was commissioned by the Ministry of Ecological Transition to the College of Engineers of Ports, Canals and Roads, after countless reports, for it to issue a final advice. According to the report, “the hillside has sufficient stability to put the associated dams into service”. However, a filling and emptying protocol must be established to allow the immediate continuity of the dam and hillside behaviour, as well as the appropriate modifications to the construction process.

However, according to Bai's Senator Koldo Martinez Geroa, the result of the report is not so secure and full of uncertainties. In the press release published by Geroa Bai, the senator states that “since the first reading of a 637 page report many doubts arise. In the eleven pages of the conclusions, the word ‘uncertainty’ is used fourteen times.

Martinez also talks about the right side where there have been many landslides: “The high number of uncertainties present confers little reliability on any calculation or modelling for a safety coefficient”, and considers that “due to the uncertainty over the factors influencing stability, it is very difficult to demonstrate that the current conditions are above an acceptable safety factor (neither in the project nor in any official standard)”.

Lack of transparency

Both Senator Martínez and EH Member Bildu Bel Pozueta have pointed out the lack of transparency in relation to this report. The Ministry commissioned the investigation in 2018 and the College completed its work in April 2021.

The Finance Minister, Carles Mulet, in February 2020, asked the Ministry of Transition where the study was, who replied that it had already been handed over to the Government of Navarra and the Hydrographic Confederation of CHE Ebro. But the work did not show up, and last April, EH Bildu parliamentarian Adolfo Araiz asked the foral government about the report, and government spokesman Javier Ramírez told him that the government had not received the report. Finally, in response to Deputy Pozueta, the Spanish Ministry of Transition has just approved on 15 September in the Congress that left him in the hands of the Foral Government on 22 July.

Pozueta calls for the appearance of Teresa Ribera in Congress to give explanations, in the meantime, the works of the reservoir are paralysed until they are in a position to guarantee safety.