With Galician friends we have gone from Never Mais to Outra Máis. Is this a new Prestige? No. This does not mean, of course, that the problem must be removed, because to do so there is the Xunta itself, but under no circumstances can 26 tonnes of Toconao dead pellets be compared with 63,000 tonnes of Prestige oil. But be careful. On the one hand, because these pellets will also influence the environment and, above all, because they have shown that the authorities had learned nothing from that disaster.

Pellets are the finger pointing at the moon. And what is that moon? For a case like the Prestige can certainly happen again. Because, according to the statistics, taking into account the boat navigation in Galicia, it is only a matter of time, but to this we must add that the Administration will act in the same way as it did then, as it is acting now: firstly, it will deny the existence of the problem and, when it persists in the denial, it will try to minimize the problem and hold the other grandmother responsible. In our view, this is, at least to a large extent, a consequence of impunity, that is, that the real people responsible for the Prestige disaster have not sat in the dock.

And in the Basque Country, what? Well, here we have to be attentive, and if the pellets come in spots or significant lines, it can be cleaned at sea or, if there is no other remedy, on land, always with professional groups. In this case we see no reason to go to volunteering. Nor do we think it is appropriate. In any case, if it were convened, people would respond correctly, that is what we have no doubt about. In addition, CAPV public institutions should be required to act in a coordinated manner and provide citizens with transparent information.

In any case, most of the Toconao pellets will probably come to us as part of the plastic soup in the Bay of Biscay. And here we use the finger and moon metaphor again. Because in our case, the moon pointing at the finger of the pellets is a plastic problem, and we would do it wrong if instead of looking at the moon we were looking at our finger.

What is the size of the problems of plastics in the Gulf of Bizkaia? Well look, in 2016, it was said that there were 50 million tons of waste. A few years have passed, so there will be more today. However, we have more recent and detailed data. We literally and numerically copy from your website some conclusions from AZTI’s 2022 research on this topic: “The average abundance of plastic found was 739,395 per square kilometer and 2,625,271 plastic pieces (equivalent to 998 and 4,338 grams per square kilometer), with an average of 232,227 elements per square kilometer.” “Microplastics account for 93% of the amount of plastic present in the samples analysed (28% by weight), mesoplastics 7% (26%) and macroplastics 1% (46%)”; “this oceanographic area of the Gulf of Bizkaia is a “blind alley” for the microplastics”; “this study shows that the water from the southeast coast of the Gulf of Bizkaia is a hot point collection.

Where does all that plastic come from? Mostly by land. 80% of the waste discharged into the sea is plastic.

Okay, from land, but from land? Because plastics “are a global problem…”. Yes, it is a global problem, but to avoid the temptation to use “globality” as an excuse, here is another phrase copied from the AZTI website: “The trash we find in the Gulf of Bizkaia is basically generated by citizens living in the Gulf of Bizkaia itself and does not come from China.”

How does all this plastic get to the sea? Usually by sewers and rivers. Rivers, streams, rions are real highways for plastics to reach the sea. That is why, as we have said many times, the sea, as far as plastic is concerned, begins in our homes, even if the beach does not survive.

How do we tackle the problem? Above all, there must be limits to the abusive production of plastics, especially to use and throw away. The EU has taken some steps in this direction, but very few and very short, of course. We citizens must make more responsible use of plastics and, of course, put them in the right container for recycling. But among the macro decisions that the EU can make and what individuals can do, there are many institutions with competences. There's Ura, there's also Members and city councils.

Preventive measures can be taken, such as the laying of grids at the bottom of the railways at the riverbanks. This is one of the measures that Eguzki has promoted in recent years. Grids don't do miracles, of course, but they work. In addition, municipalities can provide means to regularly clean the rivers and streams, as they are put to clean the plazas or streets of the town. And for cleaning by a professional team. Once a year, on the pretext of “awareness”, we do not find it acceptable to organize a day of cleanliness with the children of the people’s schools, unless it is integrated into the logic of a broader plan for the defense of the river.

And, of course, the regulations and ordinances for the conservation of the river, including the sanctions, must be complied with. The imposition of vehicle parking penalties is very common and has nothing to do with the Mordaza or Hacienda Act. Concerning the environment, there are reluctance to impose sanctions, as if everything were resolved with the mantra of “awareness” and “awareness”. However, what is clear is that in the rivers there are a lot of waste, which is not because it has fallen into carelessness, accident or wind. There are those who have expressly thrown them out, some use the rivers as private landfills. For years they have done so without consequences or without consequences. Meanwhile, rivers will remain landfills. In 2024, whoever dumps the trash bags from the balcony or deposits the waste on the river bank to take them before the big water comes, must be penalized.

In other words, the problem can and must be addressed in many ways. See if the finger that comes from Galicia in the form of pellets serves to observe the plastic sea moon here.

Ecologist Group Eguzki