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Teresa Ribera, Minister for the Ecological Transition in office, has been satisfied with the progress of the "time trial" preparations for the next Climate Summit, which will be held in Madrid between the next days 2 and 13 December.

The organization of the Summit, which was to be held in Chile and Spain assumed at the last moment for security reasons, will cost around 60 million euros and is expected to have an impact of 100 million euros in the city of Madrid and its surroundings.

These forecasts are still "first figures, not very precise", as the acting minister warned. The appearance of new sponsorships could lower the budget and, in any case, these are preliminary calculations. One way or another, the economic impact is expected to be positive.

The Summit, whose official name is COP 25, will take about 25,000 people to Madrid, for whom the Government has already blocked 5,000 hotel rooms. Spain offered the headquarters and logistics preparation to Chile, a country that maintains the presidency of the event. Now, the "big challenge" is to organize it in record time. "The confidence that countries have placed in us is something we are proud of," Ribera said.

For the minister, the offer responded to Spain's commitment to "multilateral action, climate and South America." The Summit will also be a meeting from which a "cycle change in the UN's work on climate change" is expected, according to Ribera. Change that will consist, as anticipated already in the previous one of Summit of Paris , in happening of the legislation to the action.

This is collected, in fact, the logo of the Summit, whose motto is: "Time for action". The name of the headquarters, Madrid, has been incorporated into the emblem, along with that of Chile. "It was not about discussing or competing," the minister explained, so Spain always started with the idea that Chile would maintain the presidency.

Without Trump or Greta?

Perhaps the most iconic image of the previous Climate Summit in New York , held last September and whose function was to prepare the next meeting in Madrid, was the one that brought together US President Donald Trump and Swedish activist Greta Thunberg . A photograph that does not seem to be repeated in December.

On the one hand, the US has begun the procedures to get off the Paris Agreement, from which it will work on the new Summit. While there has been no official notification, Trump may not visit Madrid, after having unchecked the international climate agenda.

As for activist Greta Thunberg, who crossed the ocean by boat to New York to avoid polluting emissions, the circumstances are very different: given that "the North Atlantic is hardly passable at this time of year," Ribera explained, it is not He hopes that the young Swedish can make a similar trip. The Government, which has had conversations with its surroundings, plans to offer the possibility of participating at a distance.

Madrid, capital of the climate

The Ifema fairgrounds, in Madrid, will host the Summit over an area of ​​100,000 square meters, distributed in different official areas and others open to civil society participation. In addition, another 13,000 square meters are planned to house visitors.

La Castellana, the main artery of the capital, will be used for public and private institutions that wish to develop dissemination and awareness projects on climate change.

The project, called Castellana Verde, will not affect traffic, explained the minister: "There are no planned traffic cuts in the Castellana."

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