La noticia de “revitalizar” la economía de la comarca de Los Monegros (Aragón, España) en base al modelo de la ciudad norteamericana de Las Vegas (centro turístico del juego de fama mundial), con la construcción de un complejo de casinos, hoteles (¡treintaidos!), parques temáticos (!cuatro!) y campos de golf por parte de la empresa Internacional Leisure Development, y que la Diputación General de Aragón presenta como un gran éxito de gestión, asusta, y ha disparado las críticas de organizaciones ecologistas y partidos de izquierda.
¿De dónde saldrá el agua y los recursos energéticos para cubrir la demandas de semejante atrocidad faraónica? ¿Habremos salvado al río Ebro de un Plan Hidrológico Nacional que quería terminar con él para matarlo ahora en semejante empresa? Si bien la inversión de la construcción del complejo será con fondos públicos (o eso dicen), ¿saldrán de fondos privados las infraestructuras de transporte que se requerirán (ferrocarriles, autopistas y carreteras, incluso tal vez aereopuertos)? En otras palabras, ¿en qué se acabarán dedicando los 600 millones anuales en impuestos que el gobierno autonómico considera que obtendrá? ¿Y el impacto sobre el medioambiente? Que Los Monegros parezca un desierto no quiere decir que no sea un ecosistema rico en especies y con un valor ecológico nada desdeñable.
Políticas como estas deslegitimiza el empeño de la principal institución pública aragonesa, gobernada en coalición por el Partido Socialista Obrero Español y el conservador Partido Aragonés Regionalista, en aparecer como la gran defensora de la Nueva Cultura del Agua, lema principal de la EXPO de Zaragoza del próximo año. EXPO, por otro lado, que ya es, en sí mismo, un ejemplo de insostenibilidad.
A los promotores del complejo y a las instituciones políticas que lo defienden se les tendría que recordar los graves problemas de sostenibilidad que padece la ciudad de Las Vegas a las que se pretende emular por la escasez de agua, y que está enfrentndo al Estadado de Nevada, donde se encuentra esa ciudad, con otras vecinas como Texas, a las que se les quiera privar de sus derechos sobre los acuíferos del Río Colorado, y que utilizan para mantener su ganadería.
A continuación presentamos un artículo periodístico en el que se informa de la decisión, así como otro que explica la oposición al proyecto de Izquierda Unida. Y finalmente, dos textos donde se refleja la crisis del modelo de Las Vegas a la que nos hemos referido.
El País. 20/11/07
El Ejecutivo autonómico afirma que el proyecto 'Gran Scala' no costará nada a las arcas públicas y que recaudará 600 millones anuales en impuestos
El vicepresidente del Gobierno aragonés, José Ángel Biel, ha asegurado hoy que los promotores del complejo de ocio que se proyecta instalar en los Monegros no han requerido en ningún momento la participación financiera del Ejecutivo, que sin embargo podría recaudar al año 600 millones de euros en impuestos. El complejo 'Gran Scala' contará con 32 hoteles, casino, cinco zonas verdes, varios campos de golf, un hipódromo, un gran centro de convenciones y una plaza de toros. Albergará a unas 100.000 personas, el doble que la población de la ciudad de Huesca, según informa hoy el Heraldo de Aragón
Los promotores (un grupo de empresas británicas, australianas, estadounidenses y francesas) tienen un "fuerte respaldo financiero" y el Gobierno de Aragón "no ha sido requerido" para participar en su financiación. Por tanto, ha precisado Biel, su tarea se limitará a vigilar para que la legislación en cuanto a Ordenación Territorial y Medio Ambiente se cumpla y a conceder las licencias cuanto se concrete el proyecto.
No obstante reconoció que el proyecto "va más allá de una inversión normal y por tanto "requiere un tratamiento especial". Los promotores del proyecto, ha explicado, están "a disposición" del Gobierno de Aragón y dispuestos a viajar a la Comunidad para presentar su idea, algo que según Biel podría producirse antes de fin de año.
El Ejecutivo conoce el proyecto desde hace tiempo y la comisión interdisciplinar que se creó para analizarlo trabaja desde enero "con gran discreción", algo que estimó fundamental para que el salga adelante.
Añadió que el Gobierno de España, y personalmente el presidente, José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, tienen "puntual información" del propio Iglesias y vaticinó al respecto que si las cifras de inversión que se manejan se concretan finalmente, el Gobierno Central "no tendrá problema para echar una mano en infraestructuras".
Con un coste estimado de 17.000 millones de euros, la inversión supone, enfatizó, multiplicar por doce la de la Exposición Internacional 2008 y lo que se recaudaría en impuestos al año es, por ejemplo, doce veces el coste del circuito de velocidad de la Ciudad del Motor de Alcañiz (Teruel). Respecto a los motivos que han hecho que los promotores se decantaran por Aragón frente a otros lugares, como Dubai o Francia, Biel puntualizó que hay razones geoestratégicas y de ubicación, de disponibilidad de agua y energía y, sobre todo, de espacio.
También se refirió a las "importantes competencias" que dispone Aragón en materias que pueden hacer posible la idea. Al vicepresidente, no obstante, le llama la atención que "tengan que venir de fuera" para decir que éste es un "magnífico lugar".
Biel defendió el proyecto, dijo que "tiene credibilidad" y "más beneficios que inconvenientes" y pidió a la sociedad "un poquito de ilusión" porque "otros estarían encantados de que les facilitaran las cosas", en alusión a otras comunidades autónomas que también optaban a acoger 'Gran Scala'. Reconoció que puede asombrar su envergadura y que a la gente "se le abren los ojos como platos" cuando escucha las cifras que se barajan y puntualizó que si sale adelante será un hecho de "gran trascendencia para Aragón", pero si no "no se habrá perdido nada", porque ninguna será la financiación pública.
Preguntado si es la parte del PAR en el Gobierno quien lidera este proyecto, aseguró que tanto su partido como el PSOE lo impulsan "con la misma fuerza" y los propios consejeros implicados no todos, porque incluso algunos se han enterado de la noticia por la prensa, reconoció- se han repartido el trabajo en la comisión interdisciplinar creada al respecto.
Agencia EFE. 21/11/2007
La presidencia de Izquierda Unida (IU) de Aragón ha aprobado por unanimidad una resolución por la que se posiciona 'frontalmente' en contra de la construcción del macroparque de ocio y juego 'Gran Scala', en la comarca de Los Monegros.
La formación se pronunció sobre este proyecto tras confirmar ayer el Gobierno aragonés que negocia con un consorcio internacional de empresas británicas, australianas, estadounidenses y francesas, la creación de un enorme complejo de hoteles, parques temáticos y casinos en unas 2.000 hectáreas de Los Monegros, con una inversión de hasta 17.000 millones de euros.
IU anuncia que incluirá el proyecto 'Gran Scala' en su denuncia a la Comisión Europea sobre el impacto del urbanismo en Aragón y que promoverá iniciativas para evitar que en la Comunidad aragonesa salga adelante una propuesta que 'va en contra del desarrollo sostenible y que no garantiza ni ofrece un futuro para los aragoneses'.
El coordinador general de IU y diputado autonómico, Adolfo Barrena, ha denunciado hoy que en el proyecto no se contempla 'algo tan importante y fundamental como el desarrollo sostenible y, además, lo anuncian tras la pasada cumbre celebrada en Valencia en la que todos parecerían estar de acuerdo en luchar contra el cambio climático'.
'Vemos, una y otra vez, cómo el Gobierno PSOE-PAR otorga un papel muy preponderante a los promotores privados en la configuración de la ordenación del territorio', señala en un comunicado.
Para la formación política, la comarca semidesértica de Los Monegros necesita un proyecto de desarrollo, pero debería estar relacionado con actividades productivas.
'Es por ello que ponemos en duda la ética del Gobierno aragonés, porque sólo piensa en recaudar impuestos con actividades relativas al ocio, como es el juego, y en impulsar un modelo que fomenta el ocio de consumo', añade Barrena.
Para el dirigente regional de IU, el Ejecutivo autonómico, si el proyecto sale adelante, 'da a quien lo promueva un nuevo y espectacular pelotazo urbanístico'.
El proyecto, que se dio a conocer en la convención anual de la Asociación Internacional de Parques Temáticos celebrada en Orlando (EEUU), plantea la construcción de numerosos hoteles, casinos y hasta cinco parques temáticos, uno de ellos denominado 'Spayland', dedicado al mundo del espionaje.
Publicado en al web de la plataforma ciudadana Utahns opposed to Las Vegas water grab. 2/10/2006
Who are we opposing?
We in Snake Valley, and Utah in general, are opposed to the water exportation scheme proposed by SNWA. We do not think the science is adequate to make decisions that could cause permanent damage to the environment of rural Utah and Nevada. Once the water starts flowing south it will be very difficult, if not impossible, to stop the flow -- regardless of impacts.
We are in conflict with the deep-pocketed and powerful gaming and land development industries.
We are not in conflict with common citizens of Las Vegas and southern Nevada. Public opinion polls in Las Vegas indicate people there are fed up with the side effects of out-of-control growth feeding the need for more and more resources and resulting in congestion, pollution, crime, illegal immigration, overcrowded schools. We have heard from many Las Vegans who do not want to pursue water from rural Nevada and Utah. A common theme is, enough is enough.
The gaming industry (an oxymoron?) wants more "suckers" to stream through their doors. A recent news story in Las Vegas reported one casino is making a sub-par 20% return on investment (ROI) and wondered how long they could possibly stay in business at that paltry rate. Most casinos rake in much more. The odds are with the house, as they say in Vegas, and what goes to Vegas truly stays there (in the vaults). The more people they can run through the system the higher the ROI. But more customers equates to more casinos which equates to more casino workers which equates to more houses, more congestion, more pollution, more crime, and more water usage.
The average Las Vegan thinks differently than the Vegas elite. In a recent documentary on Discovery Channel, a casino executive said (overlaying a bumper-to-bumper shot of the Strip) "We love congestion. It means people are here and on the move, looking for fun and excitement." Ask the average Las Vegan about congestion and you will be faced with a very frustrated person.
Dire warnings are trotted out every time something looks like it could stand in the way of bringing in more gamblers. Pat Mulroy, SNWA chief, said recently if their water rights are not approved Nevada might as well shut its doors now -- the party will be over. They won't have to wait until 2013, when Nevada's share of the Colorado River may be exhausted. Once word is out that growth might stall, New York bankers will start pulling the plug on Las Vegas. Or so the party line goes. Similar frightening predictions, of fabricated drought, were made prior to Los Angeles' draining of Owens Valley.
Governor Huntsman is to be commended as a man of integrity who speaks his mind plainly and clearly. In KUED's recent documentary, "Desert Wars - Water in the West," he answered a question commonly asked in conflicts like this: should the few sacrifice for the many? (Similar arguments were made prior to Los Angeles' draining of Owens Valley.) He said,
"I think that's a disingenuous argument. We have a way of life that ought to be protected. People have invested their livelihoods in their way of life for generations and I wouldn't want to be the arrogant one who comes along saying that their lifestyle is now anachronistic and we've got to feed the burgeoning casino and hotel business just south of them... for heaven's sake if that's where our country is going in terms of public policy, then you can expect and outbreak of civil war at some point."
Boy does he have them pegged: the arrogant ones. Let's fleece as many suckers as possible. Only let's call it something else; let's call it entertainment; let's call it Nevada's economic engine. Who cares if the majority of people on either end of the proposed pipeline don't want it. Who cares there is a minimum of science to say it is safe, let's risk permanent environmental damage; let's call that "adaptive management."
We are not in conflict with our neighboring citizens. We are in conflict with the well-heeled and greedy, who care only about their own interests.
Publicado en la web de Desert Wars: Water and the West, programa del Channel7 de la Universidad de Utah. 25/9/2006
Interviewer: Lets start out, Governor Huntsman by just telling us what your position is on this ground water issue, especially regarding the SnakeValley ranchers and the Las Vegas interests.
Governor Huntsman: I think it really comes down to an issue of sovereignty and the sovereignty then defines what our natural resources are and what we do with our resources including water which is perhaps the most precious natural resource of all. You can't exist without water--it has made the West, so to speak. If you've got water, you flourish. If you don't have water there is no way you can survive and be prosperous. Here in the western part of the state, in Snake Valley, you have a very interesting dynamic. You have an old traditional lifestyle, ranching, in a hard, scrabble part of the American West that is juxtaposed with Clark County, the fastest growing county in the United States today. Of course they have conflicting interests. I stand up strongly for the interests of our ranchers—those who want to protect their way of life and have done so for a hundred years in the western part of our state. The resources are ours and I do believe the EIS that is being done, the Environmental Impact Study, by the Department of the Interior and others I think will result in our all discovering that this big straw concept would in fact draw resources right out of the backyards of people who are trying to make a life for themselves in the western part of Utah.
Interviewer: What is your position in terms of assuaging their fears? It seems a lot of what their concerns are, are based on fears especially regarding the Southern Nevada Water Authority.
Governor Huntsman: They have to know that their state, right up to the very top and I've had them in my office a couple of times as I've gone out to see them on site, will stand with them and fight for their interests. In fact we as a state have veto authority over any decision that is made. This has to be sort of mutually acceded to between Utah and Nevada in order for this to work and I'm going to make sure that the interests of our people in the Snake Valley region are protected and that their life-styles are protected before we make any decision that would funnel water into Clark County.
Interviewer: What happens if Utah determines if there is really not surplus to be had, especially for Nevada?
Governor Huntsman: Well I think if we determine that there is not surplus water to be had then I think that Nevada has to look at some other alternative and they have to go farther in their own states or they have to look at desalinization technology. Listen if we're going to grow as rapidly as we're growing here in the West—you've got Clark County, you've got Maricopa County in Arizona, you've got the Greater Wasatch Front all growing at a very rapid clip and among the fastest in the United States—then we certainly ought to be focused on technologies that will allow us to accommodate that growth and not rip off natural resources that aren't ours. I say the same thing about nuclear waste. You know, why on earth would somebody want to bury nuclear waste in our state and disrupt pristine lands when we ought to let technology catch pace with our need to reprocess spent nuclear waste on site and not dumped in our back yard? I see water resources as no different. We need to work on technologies that will allow us to desalinize and maybe draw from some other resource where you find water aplenty, maybe with a higher salinity content, but nonetheless water that you can draw from and maybe transform it into something that is impotable. I think we're some years away from doing that and I suspect fifty years from now we're going to look back on this water war and say, that really was a thing of history because now we have the kind of technology that allows us to accommodate growth in the West.
Interviewer: What kind of technology would protect the ranchers from this kind of activity?
Governor Huntsman: In the form of, more or less, understanding between Utah and the Water Authority in Nevada where we basically have to do this kind of thing jointly and the protection would be Utah simply saying no! To me that is the ultimate protection that our State has.
Interviewer: The ranchers fear this may turn into another OwensValley. Do you think it's that dire and what can be done to protect their way of life?
Governor Huntsman: Well I think we protect their way of life by keeping their water shed or water resources in tact. They understand it far better than the rest of us. We come in pretending that we're experts with kind of an episodic visit to their valley. They've been working it for generations and they know where the resources are and they know what is theirs and they know how to use it. They know the difficulty in tapping it—good years versus bad years, and I tend to defer to the good judgment of the people of the Snake Valley region to guide my thinking anyway.
Interviewer: Talk about how these cities are growing so rapidly and taking resources from outside their area. What do you think is going to happen with these cities as they boom?
Governor Huntsman: I think John Weseley Powell basically called it right after the Civil War when he came traipsing through here in 1869/1870 where he knew better than anyone else that the Colorado River would not be able to feed the growth that would likely occur here in the West and in fact that was fairly prophetic. We are now the fastest growing region in the United States when you look at the Intermountain West and our growth does need to be supported by technologies and resources that allow us to keep pace with growth. We're not going to be able to turn this off and it will be a constant companion over the next twenty and forty years simply because we have a quality of life here in the West that is the envy of most people in the United States and indeed other place in the world. So I suspect we're going to see technologies develop that will accommodate this growth. It has to be coupled with a sense of conservation. There has to be a conservation ethic that is instilled in our younger generation so that the idea of consuming three to four hundred gallons per day per person is throttled back to a more "user friendly" level. The thought of having green grass landscapes in front of all homes and buildings is maybe re-thought fundamentally. The idea that you can have a massive water fountain in front of every grand hotel in Las Vegas probably has to be re-thought just a little bit with a sense that going forward without technologies for desalinization or some other way, we've got to maintain and even strength in a conservation ethic.
Interviewer: Is there a correlation between the pipeline project on LakePowell and the one we have in Las Vegas?
Governor Huntsman: I don't think so unless politicians on a regional basis want to play power politics. As if to say, if you don't live here then we're not going to give there. I see them very much as stand-alone projects. We have our own growth needs in Washington County, which today has 110 to 115,000 going on 300,000—it's the second fastest growing county in the country and for all the reasons that you would imagine in Clark County and Maricopa County—an enviable quality of life. People want to live there because it's affordable and it's beautiful. The air is breathable and the water is drinkable and we do have some very serious growth issues and that's land-use planning, it's how our growth occurs in terms of maintaining livable communities and quality of life and it is of course water. We live in a very thirsty and dry part of the country where water traditionally has been very cheap, second only I think to Nevada historically. So we're going to have to think through how we tackle the Lake Powell pipeline project and I'm here to tell you that it likely will not be on the twenty-year building block schedule but more likely on the ten-year schedule. That's how quickly we're growing and we're going to need to draw from the resources that it would provide.
Interviewer: One of the issues is that millions of people would benefit from this water in Las Vegas in terms of the economy and jobs and that kind of thing, as opposed to a very few in Snake Valley where water is needed for agriculture. What do you think about that in terms of should a very few sacrifice to the many can benefit?
Governor Huntsman: I think that's a disingenuous argument. We have a way of life that ought to be protected. People have invested their livelihoods in their way of life for generations and I wouldn't want to be the arrogant one who comes along saying that their lifestyle is now anachronistic and we've got to feed the burgeoning casino and hotel business just south of them… for heaven's sake if that's where our country is going in terms of public policy, then you can expect and outbreak of civil war at some point. I received and invitation—a group of them came in my office and they had some concerns and they wondered where I was going to come down on this issue. They were concerned about it so we had a round-table discussion. Cecil was there and we had county commissioners and ranchers there and I thought we had a very comprehensive discussion about the pros and cons and where things were from a public policy standpoint. I told them that I wanted to go out and visit Snake Valley to see firsthand what they were up against and so I took them up on it and Cecil was my guide and I found in Cecil and indispensable source of information about the region and the history of the region, the truth about the resources they draw upon and what kind of deleterious impact it would have ultimately if they were to have water drawn from their region. He certainly influenced my own thinking in that regard. I don't think there will be any movement at all over the next few years. I think they will be used in support of a study and I think that the study will probably lead to another study and maybe yet another study and that's sometimes the way government decision-making works. Sometimes studies are the decisions. Nobody can quite agree on what to do so another study is launched and it wouldn't surprise me if we found ourselves caught up in endless studies in the next few years and I hope by that point we get serious about some technology that would allow us to better feed, from a water resources standpoint, our burgeoning communities.
Diciembre de 2007