About a year and a half ago, the residents of Órgiva found out about a REE macro project, a power line that ran the entire north of Órgiva, with towers up to 62 m high (in the Lecrín Valley even up to 80 m). This was an outrage that threatened the health, landscape and economy of the municipality.

The locals’ response: We demonstrated in Órgiva. We demonstrated in Granada. And in record time we managed, together with the Lecrín Valley, to present 4000 objections to the project. The work continued, and the platform had discussions with the relevant administrative delegations and the Junta de Andalucía. The project was rejected and continues to be. The last step we took was to request that the ministry, through the deputies of Granada in the Cortes, withdraw the project from the national plan of electrical networks. We are waiting for a response.

The problems do not end there. REE had planned, long before we knew about the project now rejected, to increase the power of the existing 220 kv line which crosses the Tíjola plain, in addition to other sites. They use the same towers, raising five of them between 3 and 6 m. The danger here is of public health when increasing the power in cables that cross houses and fields where people work, without forgetting the danger of fires, like the one that occurred a couple of years ago on the southern face of the Sierra de Lújar. Objections are being prepared and we hope that as many people as possible will sign them, including those directly affected.

But there’s more. A few days ago we learned, through the press, of a new project that Villar Mir’s private company wants to carry out: a reversible hydroelectric plant in the Rules reservoir. Where’s the danger for Órgiva? Well, they want to bring from Rules to the Órgiva substation a new 220 kv high voltage, double circuit line, with a transport capacity of up to 320 MW. It would go parallel to the existing 132 kv one that passes over Zute, the Río Chico, La Estrella, Benizalte, Pago, La Celestina, south of Las Barreras and south of Lanjarón.

(See map, there is a point next to Órgiva – Río Chico and another one next to the Río Sucio. The section that joins those two towers crosses the places above and continues south of Las Barreras.)

The platform is against this new line and we know that the town council is as well. The problem could be if the Junta considers it to be of public utility, so little could be done.

We need to work to get this line is rejected as well, before the project is considered to be of public utility.

Together we can do it.

We will continue to inform and inform ourselves.

The Platform “DI NO A LAS TORRES”