Let’s go electric!

Antonio Tajani, a Vice-President of the European Commission and European Commissioner for Industry and Entrepreneurship, recently travelled to Milan – by fossil fuel guzzling plane – to take part in the 'Mobility Tech' exhibition. There, Trajani drove an electric Smart car to show the EU’s support for electric vehicles that will soon begin appearing en masse on our streets.
In January 2009, Catalonia Today published an in-depth report on hybrids cars, a technology that combines electrical energy with fuel-driven engines. Almost every big carmaker is offering a hybrid vehicle on its range and in the following months we will begin to see the emergence of all-electric cars, such as the Smart pictured. Catalonia is keen not to miss this particular train and the Seat factory in Martorell will soon be producing 20 electric cars every day.
We know that oil is getting increasingly expensive, as it becomes increasingly difficult to extract, forcing us to take more risks to obtain it, often with fatal consequences, such as the Gulf of Mexico’s disaster.
We are all worried about this problem, but we aren’t going to change our way of life. Governments push citizens to buy more cars, subsidising the industry and offering buyers tax breaks. Thus, electricity seems to offer the right answer. Instead of refuelling at petrol stations, we will be plugging our car in every night at home, just as we do with our iPods or our mobile phones.
However, I can’t help wondering if we aren’t solving one problem only to create another. How are we going to produce enough electricity to recharge car batteries? Most power plants are still using fossil or nuclear fuels to generate electricity. If fossil fuel, we are simply swapping the tank of the car for the tank of the power plant. If nuclear, we should keep in mind that the waste generated by nuclear plants is a hot issue in every country, especially here.
The answer could lie with wind turbines and solar energy but their contribution to the total amount of energy consumption is far from sufficient. We still wait to see how we will get around in the future.

Are you sure you want the euro?

A few months ago, EU finance ministers gave the final approval for Estonia to adopt the euro as its currency on January 1, 2011.
Meeting in Brussels, they decided to use the existing exchange rate of 15.6466 kroon to one euro as the final conversion rate.
The tiny Baltic state, with a population of 1.3 million, will become the 17th member of the single currency.
Estonia met entry requirements on inflation, debt and deficit levels, interest rates and currency stability, but one can’t help wondering if this is such a good idea and that perhaps Estonians should have second thoughts. When many eastern states joined the European Union a few years ago, adopting the euro currency was the main goal for all of them; the euro was seen as a guarantee of stability.
However, with the financial crisis that shocked the continent and the world, the euro showed that it is not invulnerable. The Greek collapse threatened the entire currency system and forced the EU to create new controls to avoid such crises in the future.
Of the EU’s 27 member states, 16 currently have the euro as their currency. Belgium, Germany, Greece, Spain, France, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Portugal, Austria and Finland adopted the currency in 2002. Slovenia joined in 2007, followed by Cyprus and Malta in 2008, and Slovakia in 2009.
Although Lord Mandelson had claimed Britain should still join the euro despite the crisis, at present public opinion in the UK is against joining the euro.
Estonian authorities are campaigning strongly to gain the approval of the public, who expect the euro to be a key element in overcoming a crisis that has hit its economy. However, a new currency is anything but new to Estonians. The kroon succeeded the mark in 1928 and was in use until the Russian invasion in 1940, after which it was replaced by the Soviet ruble. Upon regaining independence, in 1992, the kroon was reintroduced. Now the kroon will dissappear again, and the euro will be the official currency when 2011 begins.

Tarraco Arena

There was a time when it was one of the most important bullrings in Catalonia. However, with the passage of time, society has moved on and the former Plaza de Toros in Tarragona has been reinvented as the Tarraco Arena.
The bullfighting tradition in Catalonia has been consigned to the past with the passage of a recent bill outlawing the activity. From January 1, 2012, the legislation approved by the Catalan parliament comes into effect and bullfighting in Catalonia will become illegal.
Which is not to say that the legislation will make a huge impact. Nowadays there is only one active bullring left in Catalonia. It is to be found in Barcelona and is frequented by relatively small groups of foreign tourists keen to see a real corrida before they fly home. Bullfighting in Catalonia is now effectively, and legally, an abandoned tradition.
Several Catalan cities have demolished their bullrings, while others have decided to transform theirs into new spaces. In Barcelona, the old bullring in Plaça Espanya is being turned into a giant shopping centre, as well as the site for the new Rock and Roll Museum of Barcelona.
In Tarragona, the bullring was better known in its final years for hosting the annual  Castells contest. Every year, the best colles castelleres would gather and compete in building their human towers.
After major restoration work, Tarragona’s old bullring, which was built in 1883, is now the all-new Tarraco Arena Plaça (TAP), ready to host concerts, plays, and – of course – the Castells contest.
The result, after five years and 18 million euros, is spectacular, as can be seen in the photo. A huge 40-metre, 1,000-tonne, retractable dome completely covers the arena. Tarragona is hoping to be chosen as European Capital of Culture in 2016 and to host the Mediterranean Games in 2017. The new TAP is ready to be one of the main venues. Without any bulls.

Following in the footsteps of Kosovo and Montenegro

Catalonia is arriving at a crossroads in its history. In 1714, the country lost a war and was absorbed into the kingdom of Spain. Since then, the nearest the country has come to recovering its independence was the short-lived proclamation of the Catalan Republic in the early 1930s by President Francesc Macià. Until now, that is. Today, Catalonia is closer than ever to recovering its independence as a new state within the European Union.
A powerful movement is growing among the people of Catalonia. It is not led by the government or politicians, but rather by the people, who are demanding that their leaders and the political parties catch up. Last month, more than 1.5 million people poured into the streets of Barcelona to protest against the ruling of Spain’s Constitutional Court, which declared some vital articles of the Catalan Statute of Autonomy related to national symbols, language and self-government to be unconstitutional. At this expression of people power, the word 'independence' was on everyone’s lips.
Unsurprisingly, politicians wanted to lead the demonstration, but they were ignored. By definition, political parties are interested in maintaining the status quo but on this issue the reality of change is staring them in the face. Polls shows that those in favour of independence is now a majority and the politicians will have to address the issue sooner or later.
The path for them to follow now appears clearer than ever. Recently, the International Court of Justice in The Hague ruled that Kosovo’s secession declaration in 2008 had not broken international law.
Kosovo is not an isolated case and comes on the back of the 2006 referendum in favour of independence for Montenegro. The new Eastern European state is now waiting to hear that it has been accepted into the EU fold.
The narrative of Catalonia’s independence now appears clear: a formal declaration of independence from the Parlament, followed by a referendum. The people are ready. The politicians are running out of time.

Finding out "whose ass to kick"

The oil spill in the gulf of Mexico shows us that the human race’s hunger for oil may have gone too far. Oil is not only about providing fuel for cars; oil has become integral to our modern lifestyle. In one sense, we are constantly surrounded by oil, from plastic to synthetic clothing to the asphalt on our roads. At the same time, most of the energy we consume comes from fossil fuels. In the USA alone, fossil fuel use has increased 20-fold in the past four decades.
It is clear we have little appetite to radically change this way of life but the problem is that we have already consumed most of the world’s easily accessible oil. Consequently, we are forced to look for oil in ever more remote places, deeper and further out of reach than ever before, in riskier and potentially more damaging ways.
In 1969, a US company built a platform near Santa Barbara in California. A pipe failed and a hundred thousand barrels of oil poured info the sea. It took ten days to resolve. The traditional fishing industry of the area was shut down for years.
The current BP spill has spewed out as much oil as the Santa Barbara accident – each day. And it started two months ago! The Santa Barbara well was a kilometre deep. BP’s is 5,5 kilometres deep. As can be seen in the image from the European Space Agency, the spill is huge. And what you can’t see is the oil covering the ocean floor, killing all life, animal or vegetal.
Meanwhile, in Canada, companies are extracting oil from tar sands, a complex and expensive filtering process that leaves behind a devastated landscape.
President Obama wants to know "whose ass to kick". It could turn out to be his own, and yours, and mine. If we do not make moves to release ourselves from the tyranny of oil, disasters like the Gulf of Mexico spill will be ever more common. And the accusation that we are literally killing the planet will become impossible to refute.

Should we let the Catalan volcanoes rest in peace?

The whole of Europe has been seriously affected by a mischievous volcano in Iceland called Eyjafjallajökull, a name that is not only difficult to write but virtually impossible to say (unless you are a native of Iceland, naturally). It appears that the volcano’s title means "island-mountain-glacier". Icelanders are evidently the sort of people who call a spade a spade.
The volcanic eruption caused major disruption to air travel across western Europe and provided us with a timely reminder that it is Mother Earth who ultimately runs things on this planet. We have become perhaps too comfortable with our dominance of resources and our overcoming of distances. However, the hard-to-pronounce volcano in Iceland has helped to open our eyes to the limits of our control.
Talking about lava and ash, we must not forget that Catalonia is also a land of volcanoes to be found in the counties of La Selva and La Garrotxa. The La Garrotxa nature park is dotted with old volcanoes, such as the Croscat in the photo.
Unlike those in Iceland, our volcanoes are no cause for concern. The Croscat’s most recent eruptions were well over 10,000 years ago. However, it seems as if they were huge eruptions and the Catalan Flintstones of that time will have seen lava extending for 20 km. Perhaps, it is better to let Catalonia’s volcanoes rest in peace.
On the other hand, there are enough smart people out there to beg the question as to why there is not more interest and respect shown for the Catalan volcanoes.
In the crater of the Santa Margarida volcano, a chapel was even built some centuries ago. And, as the picture shows, the Croscat volcano even had a slice taken out of it to show what it looks like on the inside! Fortunately, Mother Earth did not take offence and appears to have finished with our volcanoes. However, that does not mean that we should also forget about them.

How about a giant caganer instead?

Belgian artist Patrick Gerola recently inaugurated a major exhibition in Brussels, hosted by the European Commission in its headquarters.
Gerola is a painter who grew up in his artist mother’s studio but moved to Japan in his earlies twenties, where he was to make his name. Since then his work has shown an original blend of his western origins and the Asian cultures that were such an influence on him.
As is so often the case, sooner or later one’s attention turns back towards home. Gerola’s Brussels exhibition is dedicated to perhaps the most famous Belgian landmark of them all, the Manneken Pis (the petit Julien in French). The exhibition features a large number of figures representing the well-known statue of the little boy urinating but made of all sorts of different materials and colours.
It makes me wonder what would have happened if Gerola had been Catalan?
Can you imagine the Berlaymont building full of large caganers in different sizes and colours? What’s more, the caganer tradition allows the artist more freedom because the squatting crapper can be applied to all sort of public figures, as Catalonia Today revealed in its December edition.
Imagine the impression such an exhibition would make on the world if it contained giant caganers of Nicolas Sarkozy, Angela Merkel, Gordon Brown or European Commission president José Manuel Durao Barrosso.
People say that European institutions and politicians are too far removed from the everyday person. Perhaps the caganer could act as a great way of humanising our political leaders.
There are a lot of well-known Catalan artists that would be perfect for creating the figures for an exhibition of caganers in the European capital, from Antoni Tàpies to Miquel Barceló to Joan-Pere Viladecans. However, I would recommend the Alòs-Pla family in Torroella de Montgrí, the creators of the best-selling caganers every Christmas in Catalonia.
I have my fingers crossed that this will happen someday and if it does, I’ll be ready to claim for the copyright of the idea.

Underground invasion

Subterranean mechanical monsters are devouring the innards of the city of Girona to make way for the high-speed train, which will - finally - connect the two most important Catalan cities: Barcelona and Perpignan.
Girona has over the years become a first-class tourist destination thanks to its various charms. The fact that Ryanair chose the Girona-Costa Brava airport as its operational base in the south of Europe has also been a decisive contributory factor.
It is this airport, with its millions of passengers every year, that seemed the best site for a high speed train station, taking arriving passengers on to Barcelona in the south or in the direction of Paris in the north. The link with Girona could have been resolved by a few shuttle trains, such as those to be found at many European and American airports.
The pretension of grandeur shown by governments and their obsession to leave their imprint on the landscape for future generations is what led to the decision to place the high-speed train station smack in the middle of the city, which is why Girona has since been turned upside down by gargantuan-scale building work.
Squads of German engineers have invaded the streets of Girona, causing holes to be dug, such as that in the photo, which have obliged the authorities to completely cut off roads so that the huge machinery can work day and night underground at a depth of 30 metres.
However, it is not only a case of the inconvenience caused to inhabitants and visitors that these large-scale works cause. It is also the fact that digging such a huge tunnel beneath a city that is criss-crossed by five different rivers, with all the risks that brings, requires a multi-million investment.
It is true that the result is likely to be spectacular and the city will be able to boast a huge underground station at its heart. However, that should not stop us from wondering if it might not have made more sense to build a more modest station on the outskirts of the city, or at the airport, at a far more reasonable cost.