Benidorm demands the revision of the articles of the PORN of Sierra Helada for the construction of ponds for agricultural use

The local government of Benidorm will take to the plenary session next Monday a proposal to reiterate the request to the Ministry of Agriculture, Rural Development, Climate Emergency and Ecological Transition to review the articles of the Natural Resources Management Plan (PORN) of Sierra Helada and its littoral zone so as to allow the construction of ponds for agricultural use in its entirety.
The proposal considers that in this way a better management of water resources will be made possible in a sustainable way in accordance with the axis of reuse of treated water of the Spanish Strategy for Circular Economy, which would result in a positive effect on the environment and on the fighting fires, according to the motion.
Already in October 2018, the City Council approved a similar motion in which the aforementioned review was demanded "without since then any response to the request has been received", explained the councilor for Water Cycle, José Ramón González de Zárate.
This new proposal insists that the Marina Baixa has bet since the 80s of the last century for the use of regenerated waters through the improvement and execution of infrastructures or through agreements with Irrigation communities that allow the release of white waters that were intended for agricultural irrigation to be used in urban supplies.
In fact, the motion underlines, the reuse of treated wastewater is already part of the planning of water resources in the region and is an "essential" resource in the face of growing demand. However, the structural deficit in irrigation "requires increasing the number of ponds to increase the regulation capacity of available resources." A situation that collides with the current PORN, which does not allow such ponds.
"It is logical to build these," said González de Zárate, who detailed that "lines that farmers take to irrigate come out of the treatment plant, but there are times that the municipalities that put the dirty water there have more production than what farmers need. That is why ponds are necessary, so as not to throw that water into the sea and have it stored so that it can be reused by irrigators when there is a need ”.
That water that would be stored in the ponds "could also be used in the event of a fire in Sierra Helada," the councilor added.
González de Zárate has also recalled that in the last ten years the PORN articles have not been modified "and it is necessary to do so in order to protect the natural parks, because in the end it is the city councils who do it." The councillor added that the modification is "key" in order to "make investments and create infrastructure for the protection of parks."
In this sense, he gave as an example the purchase of the plot of the old Sierra Helada quarry by the real estate group TM "which is having a lot of problems to regenerate it by the PORN because it does not fit the current parameters of the legislation."