The Navarrese platform for the Urbize Rivers warns that the Ebro Hydrogaphic Confederation (CHE) is still on the table with its old project of making a dam in the town of Aizpurgi and redirecting the flow of the Zaraitzu River to the huge reservoir of Esa. They would need this water to justify the expansion project, since with the amount currently received from the Aragón and Ezka rivers it is impossible to fill a reservoir of this size.
Fito Jiménez, a well-known Navarrese engineer and activist and member of Urbíz, recently visited Aizpurgin to warn the public about the damage that the project will bring to Salazar. In an interview published this month by Mendixut magazine, he explained that the “alarm” sounded in 2016, when a CHE technician said in a meeting that “after the expansion of Esako, the regulation of the Salazar River would come”. The same was confirmed at a conference organized last year by the College of Engineers of Navarre.
The project dates back to 1977, the same study in which the construction of the reservoir of Itoiz was once carried out. Ten years later it was proposed to make a dam of 9 meters high. That’s what people are now holding in their hearts.
The members of Urbíz say that the hydrological plan of the Ebro basin, currently in force, includes a feasibility study of the water transfer project from Aizpuru to Esa: “And we thought it was in the memory box...”, Jiménez explains to the Pyrenean magazine.
10 kilometers of canal under Leire
The project dates back to 1977, the same study in which the construction of the reservoir of Itoiz was once carried out. Ten years later, the public company Obras Públicas Navarra S.A. drew up a feasibility plan to build a reservoir around Aizpurgi and the Admiralty of Nabaskoz, but eventually proposed a 9 meter high dam. That’s what people are now holding in their hearts.
The idea is to bring 170 Hm3 of water to Esa through the 10-kilometer tunnel and canal that will cross the Sierra de Leire from this dam, which would represent almost two thirds of the average annual flow of the Zaraitzu River, with the ecological damage of the legumes.
“The problem is that since Esa’s expansion they will not be able to fill it every year, the water in Aragon and Ezka is too scarce to satisfy what has been promised,” says the engineer. A study carried out by their environmental agent, Charo Brinquis, concludes that to irrigate the agricultural areas of the Bardenas and Zaragoza, more than a thousand cubes of hectometers of water should be channeled from Esa, if the flow of the Aragón and Ezka rivers is not enough to do so, especially considering climate change and the abandonment of mountain pastures.
A business that will devour the waters of Salazar
The source of the problem is in the enlargement of Esa: “It’s a project that doesn’t have legs or heads. They have promised more water than they have, they have hidden the insecurity on the slopes of the dam, and now accepting this, they want to turn security into a millionaire business for construction companies. It is a sack that continues to devour money and will probably swallow with it the waters of Salazar.”
The members of the Urhabi group are gathering information to support the Aizpuru project and recall that the Zaraitzu River has a special protection from Otsagabia to the spectacular Arbaiun canyon, so it is not possible to carry out any activity that would change the morphology of the basin: “We wish we were wrong, but we have to take the initiative so we don’t get caught off guard.”
