Spanish Govt. Halts Ebro River Diversion Plan - Reuters

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MADRID, Spain — "The new Spanish government will scrap a controversial multibillion dollar plan to divert Spain's longest river to irrigate parched regions, incoming Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero said Thursday.

The plan, approved by the outgoing conservative government, would have rerouted the Ebro with about 600 miles of pipeline to take water from the fertile northeast to the arid south. Environmentalists and residents of the parts of Spain that would lose water waged a bitter battle against the project."

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The Ebro project was the biggest and most disputed element of a wide-ranging, 4.2 billion euro (US$5.2 billion) water plan touted by the outgoing government as the answer to Spain's historic water problems. Zapatero said he would urgently launch alternative plans to relieve chronic water shortages in several southern and eastern regions but did not give any details.

As it stands, the water plan would also mean flooding valleys and villages in the Pyrenees to build about 100 dams as well as other infrastructure works. Zapatero did not talk about what his government might do about those other elements."




http://www.enn.com/news/2004-04-16/s_22897.asp