We participated in the round table ‘Water and sustainable infrastructure as a development engine’ that took place yesterday at the Madrid Climate Summit.

It is time to act against the climatic emergency and this is what the United Nations is demanding at the Climate Summit (COP 25) that is being held these days in Madrid. In this edition, the transformative role of companies in curbing and mitigating climate change has been recognized and that is why Aquona wanted to join this global event.
Aquona presented its solutions to address the sustainable management of infrastructures in the face of the double challenge of climate emergency and depopulation. The framework of this exhibition was the round table 'Water and sustainable infrastructures as a development engine' that took place at the stand that Suez, a group of companies of the Aquona is part of, has enabled in the Green Zone of COP 25. Gabriel Rubí, head of the Environment Service of the City of Palencia; Joaquín García Lucea, expert in municipal water cycle management; José Luis Quintana, expert in administrative law and partner of Rodríguez Castaño Abogados and Laura de Vega, director of Sustainable Development of Aquona, shared their vision on how to guarantee a quality water service and that it serves as an element to fix population in our country , where 60% of its municipalities have less than 1,000 inhabitants.
"Constant investment is essential in the water cycle, not only to grow in infrastructure but also to maintain what we have," said Joaquín García Lucea who also appealed to "intergenerational equity" to prevent future generations from having to load " with the investments that we have not made ”. Likewise, urban planning and design also play a fundamental role in the efficient management of water resources, as García Lucea explained.
In this sense, medium-sized cities such as Palencia are a benchmark in terms of sustainability, innovation and Smart Cities. “For several years we have been working hand in hand with Aquona so that the palencia infrastructure associated with the integral water cycle is increasingly sustainable,” said Gabriel Rubí. Some of the advances that have been made recently are the replacement of the filters of the drinking water treatment station of Palencia with new ones that generate lower energy consumption and, therefore, reduce the carbon footprint of the installation and a notable investment in network renewal that has enabled the reduction of unregistered water levels. But, without a doubt, one of the biggest milestones is the conversion into bio-factories that is being carried out in the purification plant of the capital of Palencia.
 “Together with the Aquona concessionaire, we have started the process of transforming the treatment plant into a biofactory, based on the circular economy model which revolves around three criteria: renewable energy generation, water reuse and waste recovery to generate an impact positive in society and biodiversity, ”Rubí developed. In 2018, the Palencia WWTP already generated 50% of the energy it consumed and part of the purified water goes to agricultural uses and irrigation of municipal gardens. The future challenges for action against the climatic emergency arise around a greater reduction of the carbon footprint, improving the quality of the spill and an increase in the level of energy self-sufficiency of the plant.

The vision on how to face the double challenge from the legal field was given by José Luis Quintana, who gave as an example the approval of the Circular Economy Law of Castilla La Mancha as “the first normative text of this matter in Spain”. Focusing on the field of water, Quintana pointed to the review process in which the Water Framework Directive is immersed as “an opportunity that we cannot refuse to introduce sustainability criteria” in the infrastructure and services tender processes of the water cycle . In addition to this environmental criterion, he stressed the need to have “a long-term vision” and invited the administration to take into account other parameters linked to the durability of the infrastructures and the fight against their obsolescence.
Precisely with this obsolescence of infrastructure, almost 50% of Spanish municipalities have to live, especially the most depopulated areas, which also have to deal with problems such as outdated water treatment processes, technology deficits, lack of purification or lack of investment capacity, as indicated by Laura de Vega. For this reason, the Director of Sustainable Development of Aquona pointed to economies of scale and alliances as principles for "acting before it is too late."
"The UN itself establishes it in the SDGs, precisely in 17 it talks about alliances to achieve objectives and asks the company for its transformative force" to lead these changes, he said. "Technology, knowledge, innovation, energy efficiency, digitalization," said De Vega, are the elements that companies like Aquona contribute to water management in the scenario of climate crisis.
To the question of whether public-private collaboration is decisive to promote efficient and sustainable water management in the face of depopulation and climate change, Laura de Vega, did not hesitate: the answer is yes, the private company has much to contribute in coordination with all actors".