Turn off lights, open windows at night and lower thermostats: measures to reduce Ribera's gas consumption

Once the Government achieved its objective of reducing the percentage of savings in gas consumption -from the 15% requested by Brussels to a conditional 7%-, it is now beginning to detail its plan to ensure that the reserves of the precious fuel are not seen depleted.

Everything, according to the Third Vice President and Minister of Ecological Transition,

, from a perspective of solidarity with Europe, but without fear for winter.

There is talk of saving, but the Executive's recommendations are more along the lines of not wasting.

There are several action vectors and there are also measures framed in different time frames.

At the moment, with Spanish gas reserves at around 75% and with Russia still pumping gas -albeit at a negligible level- to Germany, Ribera chooses to

, although he has also proposed a future package of measures.

"From the outset, in our homes the most important request is that we be extraordinarily careful," the minister explained in a speech on

in which she appealed to a past - "our parents remember it well" - in which saving was more normal.

The message, for now, is to make it a part of citizens' routine to be more careful.

"

", she illustrated in another appearance on television, this time in

.

Thus, as an immediate action, he focused on the thermostat, the air conditioning, the lights that stay on or even the appliances that consume without being in operation.

In this sense, he also wondered "why we don't use open windows at night to cool the temperature of our homes".

All this would provide "a very important margin" to save if everyone "assumes that they can contribute to this collective effort."

In fact, from the Ministry of Ribera they are already launching messages in this line, with saving recommendations such as using natural light, lowering the awnings in the hottest hours or resorting to fans before air conditioning.

The thermostat, indicates the body, can stay perfectly at 27 degrees.

"I think it's not only a reasonable request, but to a certain extent it also helps us find a way to show solidarity and, at the same time, to participate in public decisions," said the third vice president.

The mantra, as she repeated throughout the morning, is to be smart and careful, but in a way that doesn't affect your day-to-day;

it is a response "

".

According to the minister, after learning of the final contingency plan, the General State Administration has already adopted a savings plan, to which they hope that autonomous communities and local entities, as well as companies and industry, will join.

Once again,

(with organization of work schedules, lighting and temperature control), although here too a variable is opened up in the medium term with aid from the National Energy Efficiency Fund.

If the endowment is exhausted, Ribera advanced, they will fill the box again.

Halfway between the medium and long term, this package of measures also contemplates some that will require "a regulatory facility that we will have to put together well," the minister explained.

This also means considering replacing gas whenever possible, either with electricity or biogas.

For this, Ribera proposes the change to heat pumps or to electrify the thermal needs, although this already supposes an additional effort for the citizens.

Likewise, he recalls the importance of local energy communities or solar roofs.

However, in this case, coal would not enter, at least in Spain, since practically all the plants have been dismantled and, in addition, it is also a raw material whose price has skyrocketed and is more polluting.

Red Eléctrica has been asked if it is convenient to stop the closure of the plants that are still in a position to operate, but only as a precaution, not because it is an alternative that is on the table right now.

Meanwhile, Spain continues to fill its reserves and reminds Europe that it makes more sense for it to express its solidarity from the side of increasing gas supply, not reducing demand.

Thus, its ports are at the disposal of the continent -especially El Musel when its set-up is finished- and it can also send fuel to France through the 'tubes' that connect with its neighbors.

Even the excess energy could reach the French system, which in recent days has had problems with some of its nuclear power plants.

Also to Portugal, much more dependent on hydroelectric power stressed in a dry year, with heat waves and fires in the country.

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• Theresa Rivera

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