The Cubelles City Council has provisionally approved by a large majority to reclassify the land of the old Foix thermal power plant to accommodate the logistics center planned by the Andorran OUA Grup. Endesa sold to this group in July of last year, for a figure that it did not want to reveal due to the confidentiality agreements signed, the large plot of land where the plant and its chimney of more than 170 meters were demolished as of July 2018.
The thermal power plant began to be built in 1975 on land measuring 16 hectares (11.5 football fields) by the company Térmicas del Besós. For more than four decades this chimney marked the skyline of this municipality in the Garraf region. The logistics and commercial center will occupy 76,000 m2. It involves an investment of around 100 million euros and the creation of around 300 direct jobs.
The City Council has dismissed all allegations presented by various environmental groups. The Consistory states that the area does not affect any area of natural interest (PEIN) or the Natura 2000 Network, areas of faunal and floristic interest, areas of geological interest, public forests, or any wetland area.
The Consistory adds that “the area is made up of soils degraded by anthropogenic activities that have mostly been dismantled, leaving bare soils surrounded by patches of vegetation.” Likewise, remember that it is located on “soil formerly occupied by the Foix thermal power plant, a potentially soil-polluting activity.” Despite this, Endesa stated that, coinciding with the demolition of the plant, it would decontaminate its soils after 34 years of activity.
The mayor of Cubelles, Rosa Fonoll, understands that this macroproject will involve “the reactivation of land and planning that has become obsolete and that are located in a strategic area.” “It will serve to reinforce the regional polarity of Cubelles from an economic activity point of view and will provide new activity and the generation of new jobs in the municipality,” Fonoll insists. The mayor had been in favor of calling a citizen consultation in the event that Endesa, before selling the land, had decided to present a project for a new energy activity.
The plenary session of the City Council, in August 2023, has already agreed to take on the public initiative. That day, it initially approved the proposal for a specific modification of the General Urban Planning Plan for the transformation of the soils of the old thermal power plant.