Yesterday, Unió de Pagesos announced the progress of its offensive against wind and photovoltaic energy parks that are installed on agricultural land.
A total of 65 allegations have been presented this year before the Generalitat and the State. The union has set the goal of reducing the impact of the projects and demanding compensatory measures when these are unavoidable.
“We demand compliance with the Agrarian Spaces law and we will go to the end. Catalonia cannot afford to lose more agricultural land,” said yesterday Carles Vicente, head of organization for the union, which operates in projects that occupy more than 12 hectares.
Of the total allegations, 35 have advanced to appeals. The union is willing to go to court to demand compliance with the regulations. “In recent months we have managed to reduce the impact on four occasions and have obtained compensatory measures,” Jaume Pedrós, union leader of the Plana de Lleida, celebrated to this newspaper yesterday. The measures demanded by the union vary in each case. For now, Unió de Pagesos has managed to compensate for the potential of the lost hectares with exploitations of neighboring land and reduce the electricity rate for farmers affected by the impact of renewables.
Sources from the Department of Climate Action assure that Catalan regulations already include guarantees: “In category 1 and 2 land, the most productive, photovoltaic energy projects are not allowed, in category 3 and 4 only occupation can be made. 10% of the land and from category 5 there are no limitations,” they comment.
The approval of the Generalitat – and the State in some cases – is essential because these private initiative projects modify the use of agricultural land. This year, the Generalitat has processed a total of 120 linked to solar energy and 18 wind energy. In more than half of the cases, Unió de Pagesos has mobilized to stop them. In addition to demanding compensatory measures, the union also demands an equitable geographical distribution of the facilities, which are usually concentrated in the areas of Lleida and Tarragona. In the projects processed this year, the regions of Ribera d’Ebre, Conca de Barberà and Segrià are those with the most hectares affected.
The rise of this phenomenon in the last two years is explained by the greater profitability offered by the production of renewable energy compared to traditional agricultural exploitation, affected by climate change and the unstable economic situation. It is for this reason that it is the farmers themselves who decide to sell or rent the land to developers of solar panels or wind energy, as told in the award-winning film Alcarràs.