150 hectares for photovoltaic energy in Totana: an oasis in the south-east of the Iberian Peninsula

Solar photovoltaic energy has advanced significantly within Spain’s energy generation mix over this decade , steadily gaining ground over fossil-fuel sources. This is good news for the country’s energy independence and for reducing the emissions that drive global warming. However, large-scale solar plants can impact the surrounding landscape and environment. Spain’s topography is highly favourable to photovoltaic energy generation. Combined with a climate with abundant sunshine hours, this creates ideal conditions for its expansion and profitability—both industrially and socially—provided that favourable legislation is introduced to curb our dependence on oil and gas, resources that the country does not have.

Avoiding social and environmental conflict in their implementation must be the primary goal of this type of installations. Developers and/or operators must act with a sense of responsibility in keeping with the times we live in, where respect for the environment should be enforced by law or adopted voluntarily. Today’s society is more demanding when it comes to environmental protection, which is closely linked to the quality of life in the immediate environment. This concept is fully aligned with scientific understanding.

Social backlash against large-scale photovoltaic plants

The towns in the Guadalentín Valley have witnessed the deployment of numerous large-scale photovoltaic plants. Some have sparked social conflict and public discontent for various reasons: their disproportionate size, proximity to population centres, location in environmentally sensitive areas, high-voltage overhead lines to evacuate the electricity generated, token community sponsorships during construction aimed at ‘appeasing’ residents but often producing the opposite effect, and grandiose promises of wealth creation that are far removed from reality. These are some of the main sources of opposition among local residents. When combined with the countless rumours and misinformation that circulate daily through mobile phones, they create fertile ground for projects to be socially rejected if they are not handled with honesty and transparency. 

In the development of photovoltaic energy in Spain, large open areas of the countryside have taken the lead in hosting installations. In contrast, locating this industrial technology on already developed sites—such as communication infrastructures, aqueducts, canals, industrial parks, or public and private buildings—has lagged behind. The flood of large-scale projects that take up extensive areas near population centres has triggered exactly the kind of social opposition we mentioned earlier. Much of this backlash could be avoided by following the example of the photovoltaic project featured in this article: the Totana photovoltaic plant. During its development, construction, and daily operation, this facility has successfully avoided the common pitfalls that occur in other plants in the area and earned the approval of even the most critical sectors.

The plant is located in the area known as Flota de los Álamos. It is owned by Endesa, became operational in 2019, and is divided into three phases. This facility was built on land previously used for intensive cultivation, which originally formed part of the Guadalentín salt flats, a steppe-like area rich in birdlife that has gradually declined over decades due to the ploughing of land for intensive agriculture.

The Totana photovoltaic plant: an oasis among intensive crops

The economy of the Guadalentín Valley relies too heavily on intensive agriculture, which exploits a scarce resource in the region—water—and creates increasingly worrying environmental problems such as soil and air pollution from pesticides and plastics. This is very far removed from the traditional dryland farming of Murcia, historically a model for nature conservation. It has also led to alarming aquifer overexploitation, causing land subsidence across the Valley.

This intensive farming, which produces three to four crops per year, relied on large numbers of unskilled migrant workers tied to low wages and temporary contracts. This situation has created social conflict, including the inability to find adequate housing and difficulties in providing consistent social, educational, and healthcare services to allow many families to thrive.

Replacing this 150-hectare area, previously devoted to long-term unsustainable intensive farming, with an area full of photovoltaic panels represents a significant improvement. In addition, a series of measures have been implemented to enhance the area's prior environmental conditions. This positions the facility as an oasis, both in terms of execution and development compared with other plants, and in the role it plays, surrounded by intensive crops. Below are some of the project’s key highlights:

• The plant is located near the electric substation where its electricity is fed into the grid, all via an underground line.
• An ecological corridor has been created within the facility, deliberately left free of panels to benefit local wildlife.
• The original ground levels have been respected to allow rainwater to infiltrate into the aquifer and avoid slopes that could encourage runoff.
• Along the perimeter wildlife fence, native plant species have been planted to form a green buffer. This provides multiple benefits, including trapping dust generated by the ploughing of neighbouring fields.

• An investment of €250,000 has been allocated to support local businesses, funding forestry work, the installation of nest boxes, wildlife drinking troughs, bumblebee hives, and the construction of a bird-watching hide. The species roaming the facility are carefully tracked in a field notebook from the hide. The result of this careful management is a measurable increase in biodiversity compared with the years prior to the plant’s construction.
• The plant has also served as a research site for public agencies studying agrivoltaic systems.
• A partnership has been signed with a local livestock farmer to allow his sheep to graze within the facility, creating a highly positive synergy.
• An open-door policy invites citizens and environmental and social groups to learn about the activities and processes taking place inside the installation.

While the sheer scale of the solar plant does create a noticeable visual impact—such facilities should ideally be more modest in scale—it is also true that its placement in this particular location has helped alleviate some of the pressure exerted by intensive agriculture in the region.

The facility creates skilled jobs, does not produce polluting emissions, and consistently implements measures to minimise environmental impact and enhance biodiversity. In short, it is an oasis in the Region of Murcia.