Spain’s Energy Distribution and Economic Sectors
1. Energy Distribution
A correct distribution of energy is essential for the functioning of the current economy. This energy is guaranteed to satisfy the population, the operation of enterprises and services, and the development of a territory. Energy is distributed from the production sites or through import power grids, oil, and gas pipelines. These networks require maintenance, constant expansion, and improvement to ensure no energy losses during transport. It is important that the distribution network provides tips on energy demand.
The Spanish high-voltage electrical network is managed by Red Eléctrica of Spain and connects generating plants with distribution points to consumers. The transport network consists of 33,669 km of high-voltage lines and 3,000 distribution substations.
France acts as an importer of electricity from the first two exporting countries and the other two.
Natural gas is distributed through a network of 7,752 km of pipelines within the peninsula. From Morocco and below the Strait of Gibraltar, a pipeline carries gas from the Hasssi R’Mel site in Algeria, including the pipeline that connects with the distribution network across France and Europe. Another pipeline connects via Portugal and Badajoz-Tui from the same Algerian site, and another pipeline will cross the sea to Almeria. The pipeline network is complete with regasification plants, the most important located in Barcelona, Huelva, and Cartagena. The natural gas distribution market is liberalized with different companies involved, the most important being Naturgy.
The Oil Pipeline Network is 3,835 km long. Distribution starts from ports that have facilities to receive oil from importing countries. These ports are connected with eight refineries, which divide the different fractions of crude by boiling point and apply the necessary treatments to obtain petrol, kerosene, diesel, lubricants, tar, and other products. Since 1992, the Spanish oil sector has been liberalized, the most important companies being Cepsa and Repsol-YPF. The distribution network is controlled by the CLH Group (Compañía Logística de Hidrocarburos). The main activity of this company is the storage, transport, and distribution of petroleum products.
1.2 Commercial and Financial Sector
Trade has a very significant importance in the economic system because it makes the bond between the productive sector and the consuming public.
Domestic trade has developed significantly. Small traditional shops have lost importance while large supermarkets and shopping centers have gained. The main commercial areas of the state are located around the cities of Madrid, Barcelona, Valencia, Seville, and Alicante.
The Spanish financial sector has undergone a very important transformation, mainly caused by the globalization of the economy and startups. The number of banks and savings banks has been declining due to the disappearance of smaller entities and the union of larger ones. The most important financial companies are two banking groups resulting from the merger of several banks: Santander Central Hispano Group and Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria Group. The three largest savings banks are CaixaBank, the Catalan savings banks, and Monte de Piedad de Madrid. Santander is the only group among the top hundred companies in the world.
1.3 Basic Social Services
Educational services cover 600,000 people, of which nearly three-quarters work for public schools and the rest for privately owned centers. Hospitals may be owned publicly or privately. In Spain, there are 26.3 hospital beds per 1,000 people in operation and 1.73 hospitals per 100,000 inhabitants. The number of people employed in this sector is over 400,000.
1.4 Tourism Sector and its Impact
The tourism sector is one of the engines of the Spanish economy. Tourism generates many jobs. Spain is the world’s second tourist destination after France. The autonomous region with the largest number of hotel rooms is the Balearic Islands, followed by Catalonia and Andalusia.
Foreign tourism accounts for two-thirds of the volume of tourist movement, while domestic tourism represents the other third. Foreign tourists mainly come from the EU. The Balearic Islands, Catalonia, and the Canary Islands dominate in foreign tourism; the rest of the communities are dominated by domestic tourism.
There are areas, such as the Canary Islands, the Balearic Islands, and some counties on the Mediterranean coast, that depend almost exclusively on tourism. This dependency is not good because they could face a very serious situation in case of a hypothetical crisis in the sector.
Another problem is the excessive seasonality of tourism. Some places are overcrowded and congested in summer and almost deserted in winter, which produces many kinds of imbalances, such as temporary and casual employment for people who work there.
One outstanding problem is the environmental impact that mass tourism tends to generate. The concentration generated by tourism often leads to problems as diverse as wastewater treatment, waste management, road saturation, and noise pollution.
Other important natural resources include soil, solar radiation, wind, and forest resources.
In Spain, we find four types of soils:
- Inceptisols: Occupy more than half of the territory and are young, suitable for agriculture if they have enough moisture. They are located on slopes.
- Entisols: Occupy 15% of the land and are undeveloped soils, quite unaltered material. They are found on high plains, the Mediterranean coast, and river valleys.
- Aridisols: Occupy 10% of the territory and are surface soils rich in salts. They are found in areas where evapotranspiration exceeds precipitation, which limits agricultural productivity.
- Alfisols: Occupy 5% of the territory, are productive dry soils, and are preferably found in fluvial terraces with good drainage, making them suited for irrigation.
Solar radiation, measured in kilowatt-hours per square meter of land surface, is essential for the development of agricultural activities, photovoltaic energy production, and also gives rise to significant tourist activity.
Forest areas are important for the conservation of plant and animal biodiversity, CO2 fixation, biomass use, and social demands.
Natural wind resources in the Peninsula are abundant in very specific, narrow areas such as Gibraltar, the Ebro Valley, and other estuaries of Galicia. Wind energy use can lead to significant savings on the use of other polluting energy sources.