The basic management document for the port of Pasaia would not exceed a single statistical ethsamine. A student from the Polytechnic University of Barcelona has analyzed this document to carry out the end-of-career project and, after reviewing the calculations, has come to this conclusion.

The work has shown that the master plan drawn up by the Port Authority of Pasaia, which prioritizes the external port, does not use the sufficient data required by the statistics, so the resulting estimates lack reliability: “The econometric analysis, which justifies the need for the external port, is in question,” said the paper.

In this way, the master plan not only raises environmental or financial doubts, but also technically. The external quay project, which some political parties have described as “strategic” and “indispensable”, is running out of buoys and is about to sink.

Infrastructure Master Plan

The Infrastructure Master Plan establishes the infrastructure of the port of Pasaia for the coming years. The master plan was drawn up in 2008 by the company Iberinsa, at the request of the Port Authority of Pasaia (APP). The PPP president then, Joxe Juan González de Txabarri, dared to say that the port authorities that planned to complete the formalities for the approval of the plan for 2009, “we are at the last minute of the planning”, and planned to start the works in 2012.

Four years later, the processing has not advanced and, for the time being, not a single stone on the cliffs of Jaizkibel has been affected. The numerous allegations to the Master Plan and the environmental report it contains, as well as the reservations of public bodies, especially the Spanish Ministry of the Environment, have shown that the document has serious shortcomings.

But the economic crisis has been the idea of the super port, which emerged in the 1990s in the Chamber of Commerce of Gipuzkoa, which has destabilised it more than ever. Current port managers seem to point to "procrastination" until funding is obtained.

The Master Plan has drawn a number of solutions for the port of Pasaia, but has considered the exterior port as the only “feasible” option to revitalize the bay of Pasaia.

The authors of the document conclude that the current port will “saturate” in the short term – when the investigation that was still at the beginning of the crisis was carried out. The merchandise that the port cannot receive a year is over 6 million tonnes and according to the Master Plan, about 16 million tonnes would be moved in Pasaia by 2028. Pulling these figures, the document states that the current port would not be able to grow inside, among other reasons because of the difficulties of access to the canal of the giant ships travelling through the wide ocean and the lack of space on the docks. “It is necessary to propose the external port as a solution for the future,” the text states.

However, there is no exterior port project that has been talked about so much, just drawings. The Master Plan makes a brief reference to the characteristics of the pier: A 100-hectare esplanade, with docks 3 kilometres long and a boat area with a length of 236 metres, “twice the Anoeta football field, including the track of athletics”, according to former APP President Miguel Buen.

All these forecasts, dimensions and reasoning have their origin primarily in a measurement: the econometric analysis. To put it in some way, a retrospective look is made to invent the traffic of the future and design a port based on them. This econometry has been questioned by an engineer who has just completed his career.

R verify 2 = 0

Donostiarra Beñat Oliveira was very clear where he was going to put the end of the career project in engineering. The family has a close relationship with Pasaia, the grandfather was captain of a ship, the discussion of the exterior port was in the cistern truck... “I had all the ingredients to do a decent job, I was motivated, so go ahead.”

The revitalization of the bay and the reorganization of the inland port were two of the objectives addressed by Oliveira. In order to carry out the project, several professors from the Polytechnic University of Barcelona collaborated, some curated in the port of Barcelona and others directly related to the Ministry of Development of Spain.

The project shows that the port has the potential to remain inside the bay and that there is space for a container terminal for the benefit of the surrounding villages (see table).

But it's not just that. Oliveira also broke down calculations of the various documents defending the external port and defending the external port. Specifically, it reworked the prognosis or prediction of the traffic that is performed in the econometric analysis of the master plan. He was amazed at the consequences that were deducted, both he and the professor.

Prognosis can be done with linear regression. For people of flesh and bone, it's a graph full of little dots, and a central straight line marks the trend. To achieve this trend, at least 30 data or “dots” are needed. The Port of Pasaia Master Plan collects only traffic data between the years 1997-2007: “‘In serious scientific work you cannot present a regression based on 10 facts,’ those were the words used by the professor,” says Oliveira.

However, there is a way to control the reliability of this trend: R with coefficient 2. By applying this equation, a value is obtained: Between 0 – the trend is amazing – and 1 – you can trust. However, the PPP document does not contain R 2. Why? Oliveira himself found the answer after making an equation with a statistical software: “The APP note is 0.”

“I have no doubt, they already knew what they were,” says Oliveira. To make a regression is very simple, you can get it with Wikipedia. But they do more complicated exercises, like the logarithm of GDP that serves to get better results. So how can you not know the importance of R Tom2? That denounces them.”

Therefore, a simple number would alter the calculations of the document, “the authors know that they cannot draw any conclusions from that research.” And when a college student begins to ask where and how and asks for information, they stop answering emails from the port of Pasaia. Were they afraid that it would be suggested that resignation be suspended?

With the end-of-career project in one hand and the “outstanding” note in the other, Beñat Oliveira met with several members of the Port of Pasaia Forum, which reflects on the exterior port, to publicize his alternative until he moved to Australia to PhD.

A port available to tenants

“Beñat Oliveira’s work shows that a container terminal enters the bay,” explains José Javier Belza. Belza is an economist, environmental consultant and promoter of the Puerto de Pasaia Forum. In his view, the main problem with the port is that 93 per cent of its land is for various companies for many years: “The port is in the hands of the tenants, so they have gone to look for more land out, because it is no longer inside. Miguel Buen has recently made concessions for 20 years, but that is not said.”

The Port of Pasaia Forum has done a great deal of work by dismantling the data used in favour of the external port. For example, they have kicked the economic forecasts in their claim. In their opinion, the profitability of the project will be twelve times lower than that established by law, while the year will be around 0.2%.

With this result, it is not easy to believe that it will promote the regeneration of the surrounding villages: “The port is thinking about its economy, not that of the region.”

Among the thousands of claims contained in the PPP Master Plan, some are very significant. The Representative of Gipuzkoa, led by Bildu, has presented a very critical report with the help of Juan Carlos Alduntzin, former Mayor of Pasaia and current Head of Cabinet of the Deputy. The 34-page report, prepared by technicians from different departments, detects incompatibilities with the law, among other issues.

The change of position of the Member has had a great impact, as he was a passionate advocate of the external port when he was in the hands of the PNV. But the movement of diplomatic strands by the French Government has created a bigger ciculusal so that the master plan can be visible in the Department of Atlantic Pyrenees. It's not common for a state to put that finger on a neighbor's plate.

As a result, numerous associations and institutions in Lapurdi and France have also submitted claims to the document, in particular to denounce the environmental damage it would entail. In fact, the super port would jeopardise the prolific maritime area between Biarritz and San Sebastian, with the richest biodiversity on the Atlantic coast.

The last tie was created by the Environmental Minister of the Basque Government, Ana Oregon, who described the work as “pharaonic”. The response of the PNV of Gipuzkoa has been both contradictory and clarifying: rejecting this type of project means giving up a “competitive, modern and sustainable Gipuzkoa”.

Political decision

The port of Pasaia is facing decisive months. The Port Authority and the Spanish Ministry of the Environment are preparing the Environmental Report, the last step that contains the responses to the allegations. It is possible that the memory is made before summer, which will determine the future of the bay there.

This memory would affect the entire infrastructure master plan and it would seem that the idea of the external port should disappear from it. “Who knows, it is a political decision that will eventually be taken in Madrid,” says José Javier Belza. In his view, the situation could be unstable, as the exterior port would stand by until the prices of housing inside the bay, key to financing, were returned to the foam: “And in the meantime, revitalization will be paralyzed.”

The Ministry of Development, which has the last word on all this, says privately that also as an engineering infrastructure it is a nonsense, as explained to Beñat Oliveira a professor who works in that ministry: “He told me that it’s oversized, that it’s not real… But in the end it’s a political decision, and little can be done before it.”

Minister Ana Pastor explained a year ago her official position in response to a question from Amaiur in Congress: “The project will be carried out in compliance with the legal requirements and for the benefit of Pasaia, the Basque Country and all Spaniards.” At the end of the road we met with the help of Es.