The delegate of the Government of Spain in Andalusia, Pedro Fernández, announced today that in the first half of the year the construction works of flood prevention and adaptation of the Adra River riverbed will be put out to tender, “a project that has more than four million euros of budget and a period of 18 months that comes forward as a result of the dialogue and the will to agree and that will eliminate, at last, the risk of events as dramatic as those that happened in 1973”, when the water force demolished the defense wall of the Adra River, burying under the mud and the waters the municipality of Abderitano.
During the presentation of the project, Fernández recalled that “since the work of channeling the river was declared of General Interest with the first National Hydrological Plan, in 2001, more than two decades have passed, but it was in 2018 when the Government of Spain, through the General Directorate of Water of the Ministry for Ecological Transition and Demographic Challenge, resumes the project and accelerates all the procedures that allow us to say today that in the coming months the works will come to tender”.
In fact, he assured that “immediately the BOE will submit to public information the list of goods and rights affected by the project, the best possible, the one we present today, the most inclusive and environmentally friendly possible and the one that is technically most suitable to protect this city from possible floods for a return period of 500 years.”
This step has been possible, as he continued, “thanks to the good result that occurs when the institutions and those who represent them work together. It is the way to provide a better service to citizens and it is our inescapable obligation”, he said, who briefly explained the technical solution proposed, which will improve the drainage capacity on a stretch of the Adra river riverbed about 3 km from its mouth to reduce the risk of damage to the population by floods.
The drafting of the project, commissioned to the state-owned company INECO in the amount of €128,356.31, ended last November. The works have been declared of general interest of the State by being included in the list of investments of Annex II of Law 10/2001, of July 5, of the National Hydrological Plan, under the heading “Replacement and adaptation of the Adra river pipeline”.
The estimated amount for the execution of the works amounts to 4,200,000,00 €, they already have the favorable environmental impact report, giving way to the publication in the BOE of the public information of the relationship of goods and rights affected.
Hydraulic works in the province
Pedro Fernández demonstrated in the event “the support of the Government of Spain in terms of water in the province of Almería, where it has mobilized investments that exceed 225 million euros to guarantee the supply of water for irrigation and supply to the population”. As you have indicated, these are actions that, on the one hand, allow the volume of desalinated water to increase, with about 40 cubic hectares more per year, and, on the other, reduce the price by reducing the cost of its production with the installation of plants for self-supply of energy in desalination plants.
In addition, it has financed 9 irrigation modernization projects, which will allow farmers to make better use of water and reduce their costs.
Pedro Fernández has asked the Board to maintain the path of collaboration between the central and regional administration -- "as we demonstrated today in this event", he emphasized -- to be able to accompany the projects in the desalination plants with the regularization of water concessions to the irrigation communities. “It is essential that the Board complete the regularization of all authorizations of the concessions in order to put into service this important increase of about 40 more cubic hectares per year in the province of Almería,” he concluded.