But what does the future hold? Listening to our politicians, it seems the future is green, clean, and full of renewable energy. Of course, what they say and what they do are two very different things. Are we really going to change our habits and start giving our environment the care it deserves? Hard to believe.
On one side, we have all those promises to reduce CO2 emissions, protect our forests, and turn our cities into models of sustainability. On the other, we have reality: we keep building in protected areas, we keep cutting down forests to make room for new highways, and we keep watching development plans defeat environmental protection plans every time.
And then there is the water problem. Spain is a dry country, and droughts have become increasingly common. But instead of changing our farming and urban planning practices to adapt to this new reality, we keep backing crops that consume enormous quantities of water and excessive urban growth. Water is a scarce resource, but it seems we have not quite understood that.
And what about renewable energy? Yes, we have made progress installing solar and wind farms, but we are still far from being a genuinely green country. Bureaucratic hurdles and a lack of investment mean that many projects remain on paper. Meanwhile, we continue to depend heavily on fossil fuels.