Ecologistas en Acción asks to deny Transportes y Excavaciones SCCATMECA SL the extraction of aggregates in the El Jable area in Teguise. This is what it has stated in the allegations submitted to the company's request to exploit the Arenero Dorado quarry, located in Las Melianas.
This plot is located between the nuclei of Soo, Muñique and Tiagua, in the El Jable area. Thus, although this space is within the Natura 2000 Network as a Special Protection Area for BIRDS (SPA), it does not have a management plan by the Island Council.
Nor is the Plan for the Management of Natural Resources (PORN) of the Chinijo Archipelago Natural Park in force, which was overturned by a court ruling, nor is there yet a Rector Plan for Use and Management (PRUG). Therefore, Ecologistas en Acción insists on "the inviability of any sensitive transformation" until some of these management plans are implemented.
The environmental defense group adds that during the processing of a space to be declared as protected, "acts that involve a sensitive transformation of the physical and biological reality cannot be carried out that may make it impossible or significantly hinder the achievement of the objectives of said declaration."
Ecologistas en Acción advocates protecting this space until its use is regulated by a PORN or a PRUG. At the same time, it considers that any mining or resource exploitation activity should be restricted "that does not have an express authorization, subject to strict limitations to reduce impacts and allow combining certain activity with environmental values".
At this point, the importance of preserving the steppe species, which nest in the ground or small shrubs, also comes into value.
General Plan of Ordination of Teguise
The Island Plan of Territorial Ordination of Lanzarote (PIOLT) has more space for the extraction of aggregates in the projected area than that reflected in the Plan of Ordination of the Municipality of Teguise, of the year 2014.
In the Plan of Ordination of Teguise, most of the plot is located in rustic land of environmental protection, so the extraction could not be carried out. At this point, only a portion of the project would remain in the strip of rustic land of mining protection.
The company that intends to extract aggregates stated in the presented project that the PIOLT has greater value as it is a plan of greater ordination than the municipal one. However, Ecologistas en Acción defends that the municipal one is more updated and that the PIOLT "has not evolved, adapting to the transformation of the needs and physical changes of the environment".
In the project presented by Transportes y Excavaciones SCCATMECA SL they consider this difference "an erratum" in the Teguise Plan and point out a "slight" difference with respect to the Insular.
Ecologistas en Acción resolves that the project occupies rustic land of landscape protection of El Jable, where the extraction of aggregates is prohibited. At the same time, it assures that both the Cabildo of Lanzarote and the Government of the Canary Islands, endorsed the reduction of the extractive land in favor of the protected space, by not presenting allegations at the time.
The Association adds that in the Plan of Ordination in the spaces of environmental protection extractive activities are prohibited, "except when they are linked to special plans of landscape regeneration of exhausted or out of use extraction zones. Meanwhile, in the particular case of El Jable, the maintenance and preservation of the natural movement of the sand is prioritized and any use must be conditioned to the safeguard of the birds or the existing protected fauna".
Errors in the Project
Ecologistas en Acción has pointed out that the team that drafted the extraction project "has considerably expanded the area of land" that could be susceptible to extraction. According to their allegations, they have gained approximately 4,778 square meters more.
In this line, on its declaration as a public utility of the exploitation concession, the environmental group points out that it must also obtain a municipal license for earthmoving to excavate, dismantle and form dumps, with the alteration of the relief and the appearance that this entails.
On the environmental impact assessment presented by the promoter of the project, the Association highlights that it is "generic and outdated", as well as that it "deprives the Environmental Body of minimal and indispensable information" about the impact that the project may have on the environment.
At the same time, they have pointed out the importance of the principle of non-regression, that is, not to go back in the levels of environmental protection achieved.
The environmental report of the project
In the 52 pages of allegations presented by Ecologistas en Acción to the project, they also point out as "insufficient and lacking rigor" the description and the environmental inventory.
Among them, it highlights that the study assured that there was no vegetation or fauna that could be affected by this project. For example, the Association highlights the presence of endemic species such as the star chive of jable (Androcymbium psammophilum Svent), cataloged as an endemic species in the Canary Catalog of Protected Species. In this line, it criticizes "the lack of botanical content" of the text.
On the species of fauna, they also point out the value of the birds that inhabit this Special Conservation Area for Birds. Thus, there are seven species of seabirds and six species of birds of prey that nest in the area.
Of the seabirds, many maintain in the Canary Archipelago "their only enclave in the entire national territory" as is the case of the Cory's shearwater (Calonectris diomedea), the European storm petrel (Hydrobates pelagicus), the Bulwer's petrel (Bulweria bulwerii), the Madeiran storm petrel (Oceanodroma castro) or the white-faced storm petrel (Pelagodroma marina hypoleuca).
While of the birds of prey the presence of the osprey (Pandion haliaetus), Eleonora's falcon (Falco eleonorae), Egyptian vulture (Neophron percnopterus majorensis) and Barbary falcon (Falco peregrinus pelegrinoides) has been recorded. Likewise, the presence of waders and migrants is frequent.
In this space there are also steppe birds such as the Canary houbara, in critical danger of extinction by the Canary Catalog of Protected Species and the Spanish Catalog of Threatened Species.
Thus, to conclude Ecologistas en Acción opposes the project adding the importance of preserving the traditional landscape of the island and the spaces dedicated to traditional cultivation techniques that promote the food sovereignty of the island.
