Water Management in the Ebro River Basin: An Approach to the 2010-15 Hydrological Plan

Water management professionals generally recognize that the management of water in rivers and aquifers is more efficient and sustainable at the river basin level than at the political and administrative levels of regional administrations. The development and consolidation of the river basin authorities has not been without difficulties. Experience has shown that the Spanish river basin confederations, the French water agencies and the US valley authorities have been successful. There have also, however, been failures, many attributable to the difficulties of separating the political power of regions and nation-states. In the Ebro River Basin, integrated water resources management was applied even when it crossed the administrative borders of the Autonomous Communities; otherwise, the water produced by the Ebro would be one-quarter of its current volume. Thanks to the integrated management, the Ebro economic region is supplied by major reservoirs, especially the Ebro reservoir. Its major irrigation systems, the Aragón and Catalonia Canal, Bardenas, the Ebro Delta and others, are projects that were conceived under the principle of integrated water management.