San Caetano, the headquarters of the Galician Government, in Santiago de Compostela, woke up this Thursday with a cardboard pulp at the doors and several activists blocking the entrance of vehicles. It was one of Greenpeace’s characteristic civil disobedience actions, with which, in addition to reminding citizens of their opposition to the macrocellulose project that Altri plans for Palas de Rei (A Ulloa, Lugo), they regretted the silence of the president of the Xunta, Alfonso Rueda, at his request for a meeting. He hasn’t even answered them. The environmental group took advantage of the trip to San Caetano to, minutes before the action, deliver 570,000 signatures against the Portuguese multinational’s plan to the regional registry. On Sunday, December 15, the Ulloa Viva and Defensa da Ría platforms have called for a demonstration in the Galician capital with the slogan “Altri non!” Citizen protests, which warn of the effects on the natural and social environment that the plant would have, are intensifying. Meanwhile, the Rueda cabinet finalizes the plant’s environmental impact declaration and its members issue favorable gestures towards it.
It has been a year since the company requested the water concession. It is one of the most controversial points: they ask to capture 46 million liters a day from the Ulla River – not many kilometers from its source – of which 30 million will be poured back. For 75 years. As the Ulla is an internal basin of the community, the powers depend on the Xunta, specifically on Augas de Galicia, an organization of the Department of the Environment. It has not yet decided on the petition. Environmental sources also point out the contradiction between the exploitation concession of the Portodemouros reservoir, a few kilometers downstream from the possible location of the factory, and the water collection that Altri is seeking. The first, which expires in 2037 and is held by Naturgy, would clash with the second. The electricity company has been interested in the Xunta clarifying the compatibility of uses.
In addition to the water collection permit, the Galician Government must also clarify the environmental impact of the factory. Sources from the Ministry of the Environment assure that there is no specific date, but that it will not take long. Alfonso Rueda, whom the BNG usually describes as an “Altri salesman” for his support for the pulp installation, stated in August that they would resolve the environmental authorization before the end of the year. The Department of the Environment has been collecting “sectoral reports” for months, he says, to justify the environmental impact declaration. Some press has published the results of some and the minister, Ángeles Vázquez, has boasted that, in September, all the results they had were favorable. He has not made them officially public. And there will be about twenty in total, most of them written by departments of the Xunta de Galicia itself.
Serious doubts in the central government
The report that is in the public domain is the one written by 10 scientists and experts for the Consello da Cultura Galega, an institution with statutory status that advises the Executive on cultural matters. Its 180 pages conclude that “the decision to establish a textile fiber factory does not respond to either a territorial plan or an industrial plan that were environmentally evaluated” and warns that, if Altri makes its plans effective, it would cause a “serious fracture in the territory.” The Government of Alfonso Rueda did not hesitate to harshly attack the document. Rueda himself did so while admitting that he had not read it, while reproaching its editors for their supposed proximity to the BNG.
The Ulloa Viva Platform, which in May already organized a massive demonstration against the project in Palas de Rei, channeled, together with the Platform in Defense of the Ria, the presentation of more than 23,000 allegations to the environmental impact study and the integrated environmental authorization, on public display since March. The Xunta must study them before issuing its environmental impact statement. If this is negative, the initiative declines. If it is positive, the company will begin to request authorizations to build the plant. To do this, it wants to obtain 250 million euros from the Next Generation Funds. If environmental approval is obtained from the Xunta, it will be the Ministry of Industry that must decide whether to send Altri’s application to Europe.
The Portuguese company seeks to fit into the PERTE of decarbonization. Within this, the proposal would only make sense in attention to line four of the samereferring to the “development of highly efficient and decarbonized manufacturing facilities.” It happens to be endowed with a total of 150 million euros in subsidies and another 100 million in loans. That is, Altri’s intention would be for its plan to be carried out alone with all the available financing. Sources from the central government, waiting to hear the Xunta’s decision, harbor serious doubts about the environmental and economic viability of the Portuguese company’s plans. Any measure linked to PERTE must comply with the so-called DNSH principle, “do not cause significant harm”, in addition to Community environmental legislation.
Social and political opposition
The Ulloa Viva Platform, one of the organizers of the December 15 demonstration, brings together social, environmental or union opposition to the project. The Platform in Defense of Ría has joined the protests from the beginning. Its members fear the consequences of the installation on the Arousa estuary, into which the Ulla flows. But they are by no means the only agents involved. Two weeks ago, 52 environmental organizations from the five continents sent a letter to the Galician Government to request the stoppage “once and for all” of the Altri plan. Among the signatory groups, members of the Environmental Paper Network – a “very influential” international network in pulp and paper sustainability – was Canopy. This consultancy is responsible for accrediting the sustainability of fiber producers for large groups such as Inditex. Also this Wednesday, the environmental organization Adega, close to the Galician nationalist left, presented a report, prepared by biologist Ramón Varela, in which it ensures that the project hides emissions and is based on an obsolete conception of what cellulose is.
The controversy has also settled into party politics. The Popular Party fully supports the plan of the Portuguese multinational, including the mayor of Palas de Rei, which in May of last year revalidated its absolute majority. The BNG and the Socialist Party do not share his enthusiasm. They denounce that the Xunta sold, from the outset, an avant-garde sustainable plant fiber project but that it is actually cellulose. The nationalists have called to support the protest on December 15 from the emblematic Pambre castle, a valuable medieval fortress located in Palas de Rei and close to the Ulla river. Ana Pontón, leader of the Bloc, will attend the mobilization. José Ramón Gómez Besteiro, general secretary of the PSdeG, will not do it, despite his statements about how little he likes the project. “But a politician cannot stop at just yes or no,” he argues. Yes, there will be his number two in the Galician Parliament, Lara Méndez, in addition to the Socialist Xuventudes.
Famous actors such as Luís Zahera or Luís Tosar have recorded and broadcast videos in support of the Santiago de Compostela march. The musician Manu Chao has supported the Ulloa Viva Platform on his X account, which has 1.2 million followers.
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