Spain plans pipeline to avert Catalan water crisis
BARCELONA (Reuters) - Spain unveiled plans on Friday to build a pipeline to relieve drought-stricken Catalonia and prevent Barcelona running out of drinking water, but other regions are up in arms in what media have dubbed a water war.
The pipeline will take water from the mouth of the Ebro River to Barcelona, the Catalan regional capital. A hosepipe ban has already been in force for weeks and picturesque fountains have run dry in the city, a popular tourist venue.
The government said on Friday the situation in Barcelona was an emergency.
"If we don't act, the citizens of Barcelona will be without drinking water in October," said First Deputy Prime Minister Maria Teresa Fernandez de la Vega, speaking at the maiden weekly press conference of the newly re-elected Socialist government.
Reservoirs in northeast Catalonia are just 20.1 percent full after four years of drought, according to the latest official data, or just 0.1 percent above emergency levels. One Catalan reservoir is so dry that a village has reappeared after being under water since the river flowing through it was dammed.
Catalonia's department of the environment on Thursday said recent rainfall after a dry winter would only be enough to postpone emergency measures for some weeks.
WATER IMPORTS
The new pipeline is not due to be completed until October, however, and Catalonia already has plans to import water to Barcelona by sea beginning in May and by rail in August. Continued...
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