The media of Alto Deba Goiena explains that the meeting on Wednesday showed “pessimists” with the explanations of Statkraft about the wind project Itsaraz. Itsaraz is a wind farm that the Norwegian company wants to build between Eskoriatza and Aramaio. The project has generated debate and opposition and representatives of the company attended the meeting this Wednesday in Aramaio, where they gave explanations.

Several people gathered outside before the beginning of the assembly, convened by the Montes Libres de Álava platform, as a protest against the Itsaraz project.

Statkraft’s representatives, as summarised by Goiena, stressed that the project is in the ‘development’ phase and that studies to measure the impact on the environment and biodiversity are pending. They further stressed that this is a “model” for reducing the electricity bill and that stakeholders can be part of the ownership of the project. It was also assured that in the proposed site there is a lot of wind and that in the CAPV it would produce “half the energy currently produced”.

Subsequently, citizenship had the opportunity to ask and dedicate an hour to it. Among other things, Statkraft's projects included damage to Norway's bitches and to Chilean Mapuches, questioned the veracity of the research they are going to do, asked what the instruments will be to decide the future and pointed out that the value of the energy that Itsaraz will generate, both qualitative and quantitative, still do not know, as Goiena has gathered.

One of the questions that was highlighted was that of the decision-making capacity of the citizens, asking what the company would do if the Aramaios were to be given the floor and to protest against it. The answer has been that public institutions represent citizenship, because the Basque Government has the last word.

Mayor Lierni Altuna has shown his intention to organize a new session to get to know the opinion of the citizens in early 2023. The municipal representatives stated that they had not reached conclusions.