A short new documentary is exposing the lack of democratic process and the adverse social and environmental effects of the mass installation of solar and wind energy parks in Spain.
La Ruta de La Placa appeared on YouTube in late August with the mission of generating “an informed and conscious discussion about the need for a fair and respectful energy transition with rural populations, avoiding the inadvertent dangers that renewable energy macroprojects bring with them.”
Produced by Aerocoop and Dronaconia, two non-profit organisations dedicated to using drones for environmental restoration such as reforestation, the video focuses on Lucainena de Las Torres, a town of some 600 residents and 123 square kilometres in southern Spain. This Andalusian village also has the distinction of belonging to the association of Pueblos Bonitos de España (Spain’s Beautiful Villages), which means that it is considered one of the most picturesque and historically well-preserved villages in Spain.
According to the documentary, the solar park under construction near the town takes up a land area seven times that of the village itself and requires tearing up centuries-old olive groves, expropriating private property, and removing the topsoil where the solar panels are being placed. Rather than providing jobs, as companies usually promise in the places where they install solar and wind parks, it has damaged the local economy. Businesses that relied on the architectural and natural beauty of the town and its surroundings have also been deeply and negatively impacted.
Claudia, one of the residents interviewed, had part of her property expropriated in an express process to have three towers and electric lines placed on it as part of the power evacuation system. She relates in the documentary that she was paid €270 for her land plus €1 for each tower. She was not compensated at all for the negative impact on her livelihood, with her bed and breakfast having had to close. Having the solar park nearby and the towers directly on her property undermined the touristic value of her business. A family-run horse trail ride business was also similarly affected, according to the documentary.
Claudia described the desertification of the area due to the removal of the topsoil.
“Now we’re like the Sahara,” she said. “Because they removed the topsoil, whenever the wind blows the air is filled with sand and dirt.”
The documentary impresses on its audience that the situation that this village finds itself in is not an isolated incident.
“All you need to do is look at the map to know this [is] not a joke. This is a disaster,” Claudia said.
The documentary’s name is derived from an anonymous website mapping government-approved solar and wind projects in Andalusia, Spain’s southernmost province.
According to several sources, the map is the work of an association based in Málaga that keeps track of the wind and solar parks approved by both the central and regional governments. It’s a true public service, as the government itself provides no such general database, which means that collecting data involves combing through the official announcements posted daily on government websites.
As interviewees explain in the documentary, it is thanks to this map that some of those whose land was expropriated first learned that their property was slated to be covered with solar panels.
Moreover, the map provides a visual representation of the wide swaths of land in Andalucia that are being taken over by wind and solar parks, transforming the landscape. Naming the map La Ruta de la Placa (The Solar Panel Route) is a satirical twist on the cultural routes promoted by tour agencies and tourism ministries and usually centred on appealing themes such as wine, olives, chocolate, and castles. Soon, as the name implies, the only thing to see in these areas will be solar panels.
Indeed, as the documentary also shows, Spain’s government has already unofficially designated certain areas of the country to concentrate the placement of wind and solar parks, along with green hydrogen plants.
One frame of the documentary shows a map made by the private consultancy Geopol. It is based on data from the Ministry of Ecological Transition and the document La Hoja de Ruta del Hidrógeno (The Green Hydrogen Road Map). It shows a concentration of solar panels running north to south along the country’s western border with Portugal and another spanning from approximately Malaga to Barcelona.
However, the Ministry of Ecological Transition hasn’t consulted the residents of Lucainena de Las Torres and the other towns now along the Ruta de La Placa about whether they are prepared to sacrifice their towns and property for the latest trend in green environmentalism.
