https://www.europasur.es/comarca/Tarba-Energia-rescata-proyecto-Tarifa_0_1264973671.html

"Schuepbach Energy has changed its name to Tarba Energía."

"Tarba Energía, for which an investment of the order of five million euros would be necessary."

Tarba Energía rescues the project to search for gas in the Tarifa countryside

• The company plans to carry out preliminary studies before the end of the year on the possible on-farm surveys between Tahivilla and Atlanterra

Carlos Venturini and Julio Crespo, from Tarba Energía, during the presentation of the studies, yesterday in Tarifa.

Carlos Venturini and Julio Crespo, from Tarba Energía, during the presentation of the studies, yesterday in Tarifa. / IS

A. RODRÍGUEZRate, July 19, 2018 - 01: 35h

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The Tarba Energía company will resume in the coming months a project to survey several mountains of the Tarifa countryside, between Tahivilla and Atlanterra, to look for gas bags in the subsoil. This is the so-called Tesorillo project, covered by a state concession for conducting research and prospection on several private farms in the municipality that also reaches Barbate.

The director of the project, Carlos Venturini, and the legal director of Tarba Energía, Julio Crespo, presented yesterday the bases of the initiative that is in a very initial phase. Surveys prepared in 1956 already advanced the possibility of finding gas in Tarifa, although the existing extraction techniques then made it unfeasible.

The company intends now to reedit the studies of 62 years ago and assess, as a result of them, if there are possibilities of commercial exploitation of this energy resource. "We do not know what we are going to find, there are estimates that even talk about enough gas for consumption in Spain in a year, but there is no certainty," acknowledged Venturini. The commercialization of gas would be possible due to the existence of the gas pipeline that passes through the municipality as an evacuation route.

The research that Tarba Energía intends to undertake requires, in a first phase, the elaboration of geological, environmental studies and magnetotelluric investigations to refine the exploration area that will require, according to the company, between three and four months and have legal backing in the concession of the Current Ministry for the Ecological Transition. Venturini estimated that this first phase could be completed by the end of the year.

After this, the company would have to request the permits for the surveys to the Ministry, elaborate tests (one of ratification) and a third stage to analyze the commercial viability of the possible exploitation. It is a process that can range from months to years, depending on the procedures. "It's a matter of moving towards a concrete proposal," said the project director.

The polls would be made only if the result of the preliminary investigations is positive, riveted from Tarba Energía, for which an investment of the order of five million euros would be necessary.

The technical studies of the coming months will be "discrete" with just a dozen people, although subsequent surveys (never before 2019) would require a higher level of personnel mobilization.

"If carried out, the construction of the well will value the area and will have a positive impact on the economy of Tarifa, Barbate and surrounding areas, involving earthmoving companies, trucks to transport supplies, quarries for the purchase of aggregates, possible purchase of water from nearby farms, supplies for the technical staff during the drilling, accommodation and catering services, local and regional taxes ", predicted.

The company dismisses the 'fracking' as unnecessary and uneconomical

A preventive message for tranquility. The company Tarba Energía riveted that, in case of finding enough gas for its extraction within the municipality of Tarifa, never use aggressive techniques such as fracking (hydraulic fracturing). Carlos Venturini, director of the project, said that the land does not require the use of this methodology since the composition of the soil is mostly sandstone. "We would use the same method of conventional gas exploitation in sandstones that has been used since the 1960s in the Guadalquivir Valley, without any risk for nature or the population," he said. Venturini pointed out that frackingIt is a technique for other types of soil that, moreover, is not applicable for environmental reasons in Andalusia or for economic reasons. "It would be much more expensive, as well as unnecessary, for fracking it requires water, which is not available in the area, which would require the construction of a desalination plant and the costs would skyrocket," the energy company manager reassured.