Mateos links his decision on the mine to technical reports.
The mayor, Rafael Mateos, reiterated that the local government's decision on the mine will be conditioned by what is specified in the technical reports, « what I said before the elections, I keep it later, you have to be at what the technical reports say, that is the position of the Popular Party government », stressed the councilman this Wednesday, « you have to be very respectful of compliance with current legislation and that is what we are doing », assured.
Mateos spoke of the mine a day after the content of an urban report was known, he is technical and legal, which concludes that the mine project is not incompatible with the Municipal General Plan (PGM) of urban planning, provided that the extractive and productive activity allows the conservation of environmental and unique values that the urban regulation recognizes for Valdeflores.
Asked about said report, which is a turn from previous positions of the city council, in which it was ensured that the plan does not allow extractive uses in Valdelflores, the mayor did not enter to assess its content, « is part of an administrative process », he said, and the documentation that the company promoting the excavation has to send to the Board in its request to grant the exploitation of the deposit. « It is a technical document, there has been no political pronouncement », the councilor said.
The city council's report of non-incompatibility of the mine project with the municipal general plan is a document that the mine's promoter company, Extremadura New Energies, needs for the Board's General Sustainability Directorate to process the Integrated Environmental Authorization of the project. The report does not evaluate the content of the project, its technical roads or its environmental incidents, this will correspond to the Board once the company presents the exploitation plan, the feasibility and the environmental impact study and have to decide on the granting of the exploitation permit.
Mateos stressed last Tuesday, during an interview with this newspaper to be published on Sunday, that the local government's position on the mine project will be that « if you meet the requirements and with legality, you will have a green light; we did not come to choose what we like or do not like, but that what complies with the legality has to be developed ».
From the conservation association Adenex, a group that in the last legislature managed with its resources that the courts annul the two great modifications of the urban planning plan in protected soils, it was considered that the city council report cannot be considered urban compatibility, « if it is an urban compatibility report, it should clearly say that it is compatible » and not that it is not incompatible. The association insisted that in its assessment of whether soil protection affects the subsoil, the « report does not confirm that it is compatible » with urban regulations, since what « says is that there must be other reports that establish it ».
The association also argued this Wednesday that the report does not rule on the distance from the excavation with the urban core, which must be a minimum of two kilometers. « In the case » of mining, « the distance to some areas of urban land is just over a kilometer », was noted by Adenex. « Reference is made -in the report- to the distance from the plant » of treatment of the mineral with the urban nucleus, « but not that of the extractive activity that is just over a kilometer away », reiterated the association, for which the report does not dare to say clearly that it is compatible, only it is not incompatible.
Eduardo Mostazo, one of the spokesmen for the Save the Mountain of Cáceres platform, assured that they have been surprised by the conclusion reached in the city council report, « we continue to believe that the urban planning plan prohibits extractive activity on the ground and underground, whether it is more or less deep ». Mostazo assured that the report will be requested from the city council to find out its content, « the association is in the file ».
Analysis
The city council leaves the mine project alive
With its decision to consider that the project of an underground mine in Valdeflores is not incompatible with the urban planning plan, the city council has opened the door for the initiative to continue being processed and for the Board's general Sustainability directorate to decide whether to give the project environmental authorization. He could have chosen, as he did other times, especially when the mine was planned in the open air, to claim, that was what he did for example last January, that extractive activity is not allowed in Valdeflores, so he gave this assessment with the already underground project.
This time he has given another interpretation. The reading, based on the Extremaduran legislation of the soil, is that if there is no concrete express and nominal prohibition that extractive uses are not allowed in Valdeflores, they can be considered to be authorizable. The plan would no longer be an obstacle. But this does not mean that the mine can be done, but that now it will be other organizations, mainly those with environmental competence, that have to decide if it can be authorized. The discussion is no longer so focused on the town hall.
The project consists of two actions: an underground mine and a plant to process the mineral that is removed. Since the company changed the project from open to underground, the debate on how it affects a subsoil that its surface is a protected soil has always been on the table (Valdeflores is protected undeveloped land, according to plan).
In your report this week, the city council concludes that the urban planning plan does not establish where ( at what depth ) the level of protection of a land in its subsoil ends and that interior mining would be compatible with the urban planning plan depending on the depth. Again the plan would no longer be an obstacle. Other organisms will have to determine at what depth a mine can be excavated, guaranteeing that it does not have a negative impact on the protected values that are on the surface.
The proposed site for the plant to process the mineral and its adjoining facilities is also compatible with the urban planning plan, according to the report, because in this soil (not urbanizable protected Mountain in its grade one) the extractive use is authorized, including the processing and the first transformation of the mineral. But this point is going to need further development because the plant is much more than an installation to process the mineral, it is an industry that, according to the company's initial project, It occupies 10 hectares and which allocates 36 hectares to deposit the waste from the mine and the plant. And this is proposed in a land where to make a house a minimum plot of 8 hectares is required in the plan for a build of 250 square meters.
https://www.elperiodicoextremadura.com/caceres-local/2023/11/15/mateos-vincula-decision-mina-informes-94674956.html
