Water supply and sanitation in Spain is characterized by universal access and good service quality, while tariffs are among the lowest in the EU.
Almost half of the population is served by private or mixed private-public water companies, which operate under concession contracts with municipalities.
The pollutants were trihalomethane, volatile organic compounds, pesticides, nitrate, boron and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon.
[2] OCU carried out another analysis in 2014 of 62 municipalities and cities and found that 7 had issues with contamination whereof one was major (Cáceres).
Each agency has a Board, a user assembly and a council to ensure broad participation by various stakeholders in its decision-making process, both in planning and operations.
The largest public water company is Canal Isabel II that serves the metropolitan area of Madrid.
In February 2013, the director of Agbar’s Aquagest concession in Santiago de Compostela was jailed because of alleged bribes to municipal officials to ensure the renewal of his firm's contract.
[17] In June 2014 25 prominent Valencian politicians and administrators were charged with "fraudulently obtaining €23 million between 2004 and 2009 by inflating the cost of treating sewage sludge from metropolitan Valencia’s wastewater treatment plant", operated at the time by the public company EMARSA, a subsidiary of the regional wastewater company EMARSA.
In January 2016, top executives of the Spanish water companies Acciona and FCC were arrested amid these investigations.
Acuamed, an agency under the supervision of the Ministry of Environment, is in charge of major infrastructure programs financed by the central government, including desalination plants.
[19] It is common practice in Spain that municipalities legally request upfront payments (canon) when awarding water concessions.
For example, in 2012 the Barcelona metropolitan authority awarded a 35-year concession worth an estimated €330 million to Agbar without a competitive tender.
Roque Gistau, president of the Spanish water and sanitation association (AEAS), says that the current system to award contracts must be reformed.
Its basic principles, however, are the basis largely of the Law of 1879, including the public domain of all natural streams and river banks.
This provision continued in force until its retroactive amendment by the 1985 Law, and is one of the causes of the current situation of lack of administrative control of groundwater sources.
The Law regulates in a very precise way both the procedure and the general rules on the concession of public waters as well as specific provisions for the different uses (supply to populations, irrigations, industrial establishments, etc.).
Similarly, some confederations continue to emphasize their advocacy tasks while adapting to fully manage, in a broad sense, their water resources.
A survey commissioned by the utility association AEAS in 2009 showed that the average tariff for water supply and sanitation was Euro 1.50/m3.
The OCU survey also shows that annual bills vary substantially between cities, ranging from 112 to 413 Euro per year.
[26] Many cities had a large fixed fee that included a consumption of between 60 and 180 cubic meter per year, thus providing no financial incentive to save water below this level.
[28] However, the industry association AGA estimates investments by its members, which supply water to 75% of the population, at "more than €290 million" annually.
[30] "Europe's generosity has contributed to the unsustainability of the Spanish water sector's economic model", says Enrique Cabrera of the Universidad Politécnica de Valencia.