On the border between Navarra and Gipuzkoa, it is intended to build one of the great wind forests made so far in the Basque Country, between Goizueta and Hernani, in the Sierra de Adarra and Mandoegi.

According to Subai Fundazioa “both because of the project’s dimensions and because it affects different autonomous communities, the procedures are being carried out from Madrid”. If these projects have a power of more than 50 MW, they must be processed in Madrid and, according to the newspaper Berria, the macro-power station between Goizueta and Hernani would have a power of 100 MW.

Between Navarra and Gipuzkoa the size of the wind farms so far planned would double that of the existing ones. For example, in Álava, Azaceta and Laminoria, two adjacent plants are proposed, with a power between both of 80 MW. In Navarre, in the northern area of the Region of Pamplona, it is intended to install 56 large wind mills, each with a power of 4 MW, but distributed in different plants.

The municipalities of Hernani, Arano and Goizueta have not received any information about the macro-central that may affect their natural spaces. To the question of El Diario Vasco, the City Hall of Hernani explains that in February they received an e-mail from the FE Energy advisory, who have tried a meeting but have not received an answer.

These areas of Adarra and Mandoegi retain a valuable natural and cultural heritage. Its megalithic station brings together one of the largest monumental concentrations of prehistoric domes and chromlech in the Basque Country.

It is also a refuge for animal species such as the endangered bovine Betizu breed and endemic plant species are preserved in the Urumea valleys. Between the Aiako Harria Natural Park and the Leitzaran Protected Biotope, this space acts as an ecological corridor, according to expert biologists.

Who is trying to land on Waukee?

The project is being handled confidentially in Madrid and the consultant FE Energy has not wanted to give the name of the company behind it either. “There is nothing concrete or formal demand,” he said.

This consultancy is part of the Association of Wind Power Companies (AEE), a private association that groups together the main energy companies of the Spanish State, Siemens Gamesa, Acciona, Endesa, Iberdrola, etc.

Two decades ago there was a project to build a new wind farm in Mandoegi, which also had the approval of the Administration, but was suspended with the economic crisis. Now, in the documents of the Basque Government’s Sectoral Territorial Plan for Renewable Energies, the alignment between Navarra and Gipuzkoa, as ARGIA advanced, is of many kilometers classified as “optimal clean space”.

Subai Fundazioa has assessed the implications of these kinds of projects: “This renewable expansion has nothing to do with the necessary democratic planning to meet social needs: how much energy we need, what kind, where, who has to supply and manage. And, at the same time, it must be accompanied by measures to save and reduce fossil energy consumption: how to organize daily displacements, how to mitigate and replace the agricultural industrial model, how to promote a greater territorial balance, how to rethink the industrial model, how to adopt radical measures of job sharing and reproduction, integrating all this the conservation and protection of biodiversity and our ecosystems”.

When the power apparatus adopted the “ecological imperative”, journalist and ecologist André Gorz said that it only serves to strengthen its authority and that, consequently, political ecology must question capitalism itself so that it does not occur. Therefore, in this case, what are they landing on the mountain ranges of the Basque Country in search of more capital and benefits?