The third vice president and minister for the Ecological Transition and the Demographic Challenge, Sara Aagesen, stated this Monday that Spain is an example that we can “grow and do so sustainably, generate employment, quality of life, life and well-being”, and has stressed the importance of “transforming our energy system” and “reducing our dependence on resources that are finite”.
Aagesen has inaugurated the IV Conference on Circular Economy and Renewable Energy, an already consolidated debate forum to analyze the challenges and opportunities of the ecological transition in Spain, organized by elDiario.es. The third vice president has insisted on raising awareness about the responsible use of resources and the commitment to renewable energies.
He highlighted that on July 24, “humanity had already consumed the planet's resources that could be regenerated in one year.” “This overconsumption is equivalent to using the planet Earth 1.8 times,” he added, which is why he has launched a commitment to “renewable energies that are not only clean, not only more competitive and more economical, but also allow us a state of well-being and, of course, energetic and strategic autonomy.”
Furthermore, Aagesen has emphasized that investing in renewables is investing in security: “There is a letter that NATO, military and defense experts have sent, asking that spending and investments in renewable energies count as investments in security.”
“Europe is warming faster”
The third vice president has continued to insist on the need to contribute to renewable energies as the main brake on climate change. “2025 was the warmest year since we have records, when that threshold that we set 10 years ago in the Paris agreement was exceeded by five degrees. The latest report, from a few weeks ago, on the state of the climate also reminds us that Europe is warming faster than the rest of the continents,” he explained.
Aagesen has stressed that in the case of Spain, the warming of the Mediterranean is also accelerating and results in “extreme meteorological phenomena.” Thus, he referred to the DANA that left 229 fatalities in Valencia a year ago: “Today I also convey words of affection, of solidarity with all the relatives of the victims and with all those affected.”
In his speech, Aagesen highlighted some of his Ministry's projects, such as the Circular Economy Perte, the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan, the Waste Law or the renewable hydrogen storage plans, where it has gone from 28 projects to more than 500.
“Renewable energies make us competitive, they generate a well-being society in a very complicated context. We have seen that these two bets allow us to say that we have transformative results in our country. The International Monetary Fund has just updated our growth forecast to 2.9, practically triple that of the euro zone and well above large economies in the European Union,” he summarized.
“A Spain that is vulnerable to climate change requires policies that transcend legislatures. That is why we are working on a State pact against the climate emergency, where we want to listen to each and every one of the agents, civil society, companies, unions, autonomous communities, political groups, everyone. The reality is what it is, we are a vulnerable country and we have to be prepared together and united, surely “We are going to achieve it,” he concluded.