In the last debate on the Situation of the Autonomous Community of 2020, held in the Parliament of Navarre, a resolution was adopted urging the Climate Change and Energy Transition Act. It's a law that's going to have an extraordinary impact. How are we going to deal with climate change? How will the use of fossil fuels be replaced? How should the economic and health system, our mobility, the infrastructures we have, be adapted to the risks presented to us? Faced with these issues of such importance and influence in our lives, the environmental, social and trade union organizations that make up Nafarroa Bizirik want to present some critical reflections on the preliminary draft proposed.

A law under political and corporate pressure. This is a necessary legislative proposal, which should be debated a long time ago. But we must express our concern about the context in which the debate, approval and regulatory development will take place. Under the mask of green, large infrastructures are being maintained and multiplied (TAV, Yesa reservoir, Canal de Navarra, solar and wind industrial polygons, megainstalations for waste treatment, Castejón plants, extractivist mining, high energy need for hydrogen production and 5G development). And along with that, for the umpteenth time, we are suffering the attack of the multinationals, now in search of the European Reconstruction Funds.

The main problem with climate and energy is capitalist society. And there are more and more analyses that show this from the scientific point of view. The global situation of the planet is dramatic (loss of biodiversity, change of ecosystems...) Greenhouse gas emissions remain at unsustainable levels. Climate change/chaos, with its environmental and social consequences, is occurring rapidly and with wild intensity. Behind this is a global system of insatiable production and consumption, of agriculture and industrial livestock, based on oil and gas as energy support, with a single objective of unlimited growth and profit. Consequently, in addition to significantly reducing emissions of CO2 and other greenhouse gases, the current social model needs to be questioned: with lower consumption, more local, more distributor and more de-commercialised. We must call into question Navarre’s position on the international market in the hands of the multinationals and create a new economy nearby, organising a society that is simpler and more supportive of the world’s poorest regions.

They have prevented the participatory process. And we don't say it to say. The proof is that the preliminary draft was put to the public in June, only for fifteen days, in a situation of pandemic and without meeting the requirements of extending deadlines and setting up study forums. The institutional and administrative machinery has behaved in an intimidating manner, denying reasonable deadlines and possibilities for debate. It is a bad sign and from the outset it calls into question the shared governance model set out in the preliminary draft.

Planning of energy sovereignty. In the preliminary draft, energy, as well as water, is regarded as a common good, scarce and of prime necessity. Energy decisions must not be left to energy oligopolies. Everything is not valid in the decarbonisation process. Democratic planning is needed to identify the amount of energy we need and have available, to establish how this energy should be adapted and distributed from the priority uses, to be a decentralized design, to have a greater capacity for municipal action and to put management under the control of the citizens. We need a plan to ensure sovereignty and energy justice, and not to become another gear in the energy business. The non-deepening of these issues means turning into an anecdote the useful local experiences of energy production and distribution existing in our community, leaving large companies to control the energy market in order to maintain the growth model in the countries of the North at the expense of the resources of the countries of the South.

No clear objectives and commitments and no ambition. The preliminary draft has no ambition and is not sufficient with the stated objectives. Some examples. 1) Thus, the text points to a 45% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 and 80% by 2050, when there were more emissions than 2005, while the European Parliament has called for a 60% reduction in 2030 compared to 1990. 2) The preliminary draft has no carbon budget indicating the number of emissions available each year so as not to exceed the established limits, as they do in Catalonia and the Balearic Islands. 3) No targets have been defined for the reduction of greenhouse gases in the agricultural sector, for the promotion of organic farming, for the reduction of the use of synthetic pesticides and fertilisers, or for the reduction of land-use changes (e.g.: New risks proposed in the Canal de Navarra) 4). Objectives relating to the reduction of energy consumption are not assessed, nor are the needs to be met. 5) The transformations that should take place in energy consumption in order to achieve these CO2 reduction targets, The maintenance of undetermined emission and consumption targets, makes us responsible for the terrible consequences that they have for our future and for the future of humanity.

Without rail, it is not serious to talk about sustainable mobility. The preliminary draft raises the need to promote sustainable mobility, highlighting the transition to electric vehicles (private, public, road transport…), but not to mention rail, the simplest form of collective mobility and the easiest way to electrify and decarbonise. The renunciation of this mode of transport of passengers and goods, as well as the non-integration into the everyday conduct of thousands of people who could benefit from it, denotes great irresponsibility. Considering the electric vehicle as a single alternative indicates a short vision, concealing the new problems and limitations associated with them (availability of finite materials, high energy consumption and associated polluting processes, difficulties of access to heavy vehicles such as machinery, trucks).

Alarm: agricultural land is in danger. The placement of photovoltaic plates on agricultural land should be prohibited. It is not enough to recommend the preferential use of urban or urbanizable land. Agricultural land needs to be protected in quantity and quality, as it is a scarce, non-renewable and essential soil for our food. The solar polygons, although dressed in green, are the death of the rural environment.

No to an energy transition involving the sacrifice of the majority! In the coming decades there will be profound changes and painful situations, as we maintain the schemes of inequality and monopolistic power. We are already seeing it: thousands of jobs threatened, relocations, land destruction and risk of agricultural activity, impoverishment, and macro-projects of millions of euros at the expense of people’s well-being.

We do not know at the moment when this preliminary draft will be debated in Parliament, but it is time to listen to the social majority. We don't have enough law to rethink our energy model and defuse energy production. In addition, measures such as the division of labour and wealth, care plans for the people and affected districts, the rethinking of welfare taking into account natural limits, the new culture of self-sustaining and the reduction of unnecessary consumption, and decentralized and democratized organization. Faced with Climate Change, the energy transition is more serious than the mere start-up of renewables.

* The article was signed by Pablo Lorente Zapatería and Mirian Uhalte Esteban, member of the coordinator Nafarroa Bizirik Nahi dugu.

The Coordinator consists of:

AHT Gelditu Elkarlana Nafarroa, Company of 3 Erres, Ekologistak Martxan Iruñea

Fundación Subai Erakuntza, Mugarik Gabe Nafarroa, CGT-LKN Nafarroa,

ELA Nafarroa, ESK Nafarroa, LAB Nafarroa, Steilas Nafarroa.