August is the holiday month for many people, including those who rule. And yet it is common to take advantage of the month of August to deal with some issues without much noise, albeit of great importance.
This is what is happening with the project to centralize sludge management in the Navarra sewage treatment plant. This project, which has been submitted to public information during these holiday days, has revealed the intention of the Government of Navarre that waste treatment plants throughout Navarre should only be managed in two areas: The Tudela treatment plant, which would house 40% of the waste generated in Navarra, and the Arazuri plant near Pamplona, which would reach the remaining 60%.
The project could go unnoticed, as this is a small part of what is to be done in the Tudela treatment plant. However, the whole project aims to remove biogas from these sludges and, apparently, subsequently disperse a possible fertiliser in the Ribera cultivation fields. And we seem to say that, because the detail of this last phase of the project is not yet known. With a clear violation of environmental assessment legislation, the project has been artificially divided into three phases. Thus, it is not possible to adequately analyze the environmental impact of the global project. It must be borne in mind that in the final phase what will be done with the waste, which can be polluting for crops.
Furthermore, this project provides for the centralised management of these sludge only in two parts of Navarre, which is contrary to the planning carried out by the Government of Navarre itself. The Master Plan for the Integral Cycle of Water for Urban Use of Navarra 2019-2030 stated that sludge should be treated in three points: Tudela, Arazuri and a third party in Tierra Estella for the treatment of those generated in their field. However, this project completely modifies the planning carried out, and this change has taken place without analysing the current situation and rejecting public opinion.
So we see that all the waste management of Navarre, both urban and liquid solids, is being centralized in Tudela and in the Region of Pamplona. It should not be forgotten that most of the unclassified urban waste in Navarre continues to be treated in facilities located in the landfill of El Culebrete de Tudela, where only a small amount of incoming waste is recycled. It is therefore intended to extend the failing centralised urban waste management model to the management of these potentially polluting sludge. After the other, a new thymus.
In Navarre we are already suffering a large number of projects with great environmental impacts, turning our backs on Navarre citizenship. And many of them in the area of La Ribera, with punished land. Along with the treatment station, we have the High-Speed Train (TAV). Now, they want to take the Tudela station out of the city center, moving it away from people's needs spatially. Now, if the people of Tudela can walk to catch the train, under the excuse of the TAV, they must use the vehicles to reach a station that may be away from the center between 2 and 4 km, not forgetting the trimming of regional and local services that this new infrastructure can bring.
Thus, we find institutions in Navarre that are still engaged in devastating projects, especially in Tudela and the Ribera de Navarra. Small-scale projects distributed throughout the territory and based on the needs of the local population. And not the big projects that are driving the political class, that have the only apparent benefit of filling even more the pockets of the big construction companies.
Nerea Martiarena Vallero and MartÃn Zelaia Garcia, members of the Subai Erakuntza Foundation