Spain’s Catalonia Is Spending $2.6 Billion to Survive Without Rain
Barcelona and surrounding areas are planning to end their dependency on rain water by 2030 as global warming forces the region to adapt to a dramatically different climate.
Engineers carry out maintenance on reverse osmosis tubes at the ITAM Llobregat desalination plant, operated by Ens d’Abastament d’Aigua Ter-Llobregat in the El Prat de Llobregat district of Barcelona on Sept. 13, 2022.
Photographer: Angel Garcia/BloombergCatalonia, home to Spain's second-largest regional economy and popular tourist destination Barcelona, has a plan to live without rain by the end of this decade.
The multi-billion-euro strategy — which includes investing in desalination plants — has gained urgency as the region looks likely to soon declare a state of emergency for water, and global warming makes droughts in the future more common.