The aforementioned organization highlights the need to enable at least two quarries of aggregates in Tenerife based on existing demand. Employers recall that this product is “essential and irreplaceable.” In fact, they warn that it is the second most consumed raw material by man, after water.
At the moment, there is only one quarry in operation in Tenerife. This is the Archipenque, in the municipality of Arico, and it is estimated that it has little time left for extractive activity. The builders point out that, in the face of this reality, their companies will suffer a shortage or what they call indiscriminate pecking will occur in various enclaves of the territory in order to obtain what they require.
As Óscar Izquierdo explained at the time, when the Archipenque quarry is exhausted, “all the aggregate production on the Island will be in the hands of the Construction and Demolition Waste treatment plants (RCD).” But, in the opinion of the president of the employer’s association, no waste is generated, neither in volume nor in quality, sufficient to satisfy the demand.
Óscar Izquierdo thinks that the current problem is due to different factors, such as the legal tangle, the number of competent bodies and their infinite bureaucracy, the numerous overlapping planning figures and also the lack of decisive political impulse.
He emphasizes that, at the end of the previous legislature, “the Cabildo was able to initiate the modification of the Insular Plan for the Organization of the Territory (PIOT), so that it was allowed to open quarries outside the extractive areas that appear in it.” It admits that the island corporation established a roadmap that began in December 2018 with the plenary agreement to modify the PIOT and should end in November of this year. But, according to the Fepeco spokesman, “the new corporation slowed down this modification in such a way that, after two and a half years, little progress has been made in the modification.”
For the Presidency of the European Union, guaranteeing the sustainable supply of aggregates is a fundamental matter, explains Izquierdo. It clarifies that the member states carry out highways, railways, airports or homes, offices or industrial facilities worth 93,000 million euros and employ 18 million people. This activity requires that each year 2,700 million tons of aggregates are produced in almost 25,000 farms managed by some 16,000 companies throughout Europe.
Óscar Izquierdo regrets that in Tenerife it has not been possible to develop a new quarry since the mid-1990s. That is why he claims to have spaces that offer quality raw materials and with an approved and endorsed restoration plan.
