How will the world be in 2051? And the Basque Country? How will our future generations tackle with the overall negative impact of global warming? What type of air will they breathe? What will they eat and drink? Which diseases will they suffer in the year 2051? Which social services will they be provided with? Who will take care of the ill people, the elderly, the children? And how?
We have gathered in this international conference Change The Change to talk about climate change, and the mere act of organizing the event itself points out how dramatic the situation is. The beginning of this 21st century is showing crises in many different fields: economic crisis, many social crises, political crisis, energy crisis due to a shortage of energy sources -such as gas and oil-, humanitarian crisis… And all these crises are closely linked to the terrible consequences caused by the current social and economic model. Remind what experts say: all those crises will worsen due to the climate change.
This is a message to all the people who have attended this Change The Change conference: you must know that here, in the Basque Country, politicians’ policy about climate change is really harmful. The decisions they are taking are just the contrary to experts’ recommendations to solve the pernicious effects of climate change. As a result, they are subordinating the citizens’ present and future needs to market dictates: business as usual.
Governors of Donostia, Gipuzkoa and the Basque Community blindly support harmful projects to the climate change that will not be either socially or financially sustainable, such as the High-Rail speed (TGV), incineration plants, massive artificialisation of the land, a new underground in Donostia…
The citizens and associations that support the Movement Against the Incineration Plant have shown more than once that building this incineration plant poses serious health risks, that interferes with the European economy dictates, and that emits thousands of tons of CO2 to the atmosphere… Also, we have demonstrated that there are more effective and cheaper ways of minimising waste as it is done in Europe and in the Basque Country.
But our politicians do not want to listen to our requests. Have a look at this beautiful town, Donostia. This beauty contains a lethal poison. 5 km drive from Donostia there is an incineration plant set in the Añorga-Rezola factory. That plant burns waste thanks to the permission granted by local governors in 2008. And 5 km further, in the town called Zubieta, a new incineration plant is being built. In the neighbourhood of Añorga, the incineration plant of Rezola is the factory with the highest emission of CO2 in the Basque Community. The new plant they are building in Zubieta will be a new one to be added to the list of what damages climate seriously.
We are still on time to halt this second plant. The region of Donostia is already a very polluted area, therefore we can not accept to be poisoned by building this new one. Also, the new construction is being paid with public money, with our money which means that our future will be hijacked until 2051, just when public money should be invested in facing all the damages that climate change will cause.
Welcome everybody to Change The Change. Do not allow politicians of the Basque Community, Gipuzkoa and Donostia do a cheap greenwashing. Ask them for a real
commitment. Demand them to stop any kind of construction that will be bad for the climate change. As Rossano Ercolini, leader member of Zero Waste and winner of the Goldman Environmental Prize, said:
DO NOT BURN THE FUTURE