This year marks the centenary of the creation of Spain’s river basin authorities, the confederaciones hidrográficas, and the Ministry for the Ecological Transition and the Demographic Challenge (MITECO) has marked the occasion with a book presented by its Directorate-General for Water: Confederaciones Hidrográficas. 1926-2026. Cien años de historia, cien años de futuro (River Basin Authorities. 1926-2026. A hundred years of history, a hundred years of future). The event took place on 22 September 2026 at the Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando in Madrid.

The work runs to two volumes and 486 pages. Its 17 articles review the history of these bodies, their current situation and what lies ahead, with historical images of works in the basins and recent ones of water management. Its editor, Ramiro Aurín, presented it as an account of what has been inherited, what has been achieved and what lies ahead after a century of basin-based management. History and engineering meet territory, economics, the environment and governance in the book to explain the role the basin authorities have played and why they are still needed.

Dolores Pascual, Director-General for Water, described the book as a tribute to those who, inside and outside the basin authorities, have worked for a century in the service of this model. Hugo Morán, Secretary of State for the Environment and author of the epilogue, referred to the knowledge built up by these bodies as “a collective heritage” and argued that guaranteeing water availability and protecting rivers are goals that depend on each other.

According to the ministry, the idea of 1926 still holds: water does not stop at administrative boundaries, and its management is organised around the river basin as a natural unit. That idea, among other issues, was discussed at the round table held during the event, moderated by Tomás Sancho, Deputy Director of the Sub-Directorate-General for Public Water Domain and Infrastructure, with four of the authors:

  • Nuria Jiménez, Technical Director of the Guadalquivir River Basin Authority.
  • Antonio Rueda, lecturer in economics at the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid.
  • Baldomero Navalón, civil engineer (Ingeniero de Caminos, Canales y Puertos).
  • Lucía De Stefano, expert in hydrological planning.

Sources: MITECO, press release of 22 September 2026, and TecnoAqua, 25 September 2026. Image: Mequinenza reservoir on the river Ebro. kallerna, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons (cropped).