As the world fights against an unknown pandemic, we have ten years ahead of us, until 2030, to be able to combat the effects of climate change and avoid irrecoverable damage to the planet's biodiversity.

Today, October 24, we celebrate the International Day Against Climate Change, a wake-up call to avoid a future in which humans may again be forced to take refuge in their homes, but this time because outside temperatures are freezing or , on the contrary, typical of desert climates; or because cities are hit by continuous floods or droughts. But you don't have to travel back in time to discover that more than 90% of the world's children today breathe polluted air every day.
Water at the center of the fight against climate change
All the signs point in the same direction: we have to reinvent ourselves and re-imagine the future. The European Green Deal is the new growth strategy for Europe to be the first climate-neutral continent in 2050, which requires not only reducing emissions that cause global warming, but also committing to a circular economy driven by energy renewables and for a new leading role for water resources.
For its part, the European Union Reconstruction Plan - known as Next Generation EU - plans to mitigate the effects of the pandemic through new funds aimed at health, ecological transition and digitization. In terms of health, the preservation of water quality, its purification and the monitoring of water to detect and quantify the presence of the virus are vital. The ecological transition, for its part, requires extending the use of water reuse and investing more in the adequacy of infrastructures, in turn promoting the recovery of waste as new resources in a continent lacking in raw materials. Digitization presents opportunities for innovation and job creation through the application of big data to the water sector and to smart city management.
It is estimated that in 2030, 47% of the world population will live in areas with water stress. The planet will have 9.7 billion inhabitants in 2050 (70% of them housed in cities), who will consume 40% more water, and 50% more food and energy.
Aquona, promoter of the circular economy
Aquona, hand in hand with the Suez Group in Spain to which it belongs, is a firm ally of administrations, industry and citizens in the fight to mitigate the effects of the climate crisis. The company mobilizes efforts to carry out an environmental transition that requires the development of circular economy models and innovation to anticipate the demands of the future.
Aquona's climate strategy is aligned with the 2030 Agenda and the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), and adheres to the global goal of preventing the planet's global temperature from rising by more than 1.5 degrees Celsius. In Spain, the group's commitment to sustainable development (REWater Global Plan 2017-2021) includes achieving a 90% reduction in CO2 emissions from electricity consumption next year.
The COVID-19 pandemic has shown that nature and biodiversity play a protective role. The health and quality of life of living beings depend on the health of the planet. For this reason, Aquona offers administrations solutions based on nature, with initiatives linked to the protection of biodiversity and the preservation of resources.
On the other hand, Suez in Spain is transforming its main water treatment plants into biofactories, which revalue all waste, achieve energy self-sufficiency and have no impact on the environment. In this field, the Palencia wastewater treatment plant is in the process of becoming one of them, currently reaching a level of energy self-sufficiency of 50%.