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Dear Sir,

The suspension of the licences for large retail sites (MDB 4 August) will involve considerable compensation for the developers jacking up further Palma’s deficit for this year alone of 14 million euros (MDB 24 July). But it is not all bad news for some of us.
Among the developments on the Playa de Palma is the 200 shop Palma Beach complex. This required the excavation of a super large underground car park.

As I understand it the builders were soon up to their knees in water as they dug into the fresh water aquifer which comes all the way from its source - the Tramuntana Mountains.

To overcome this they installed monster pumps to dry out the area while the foundations and car park were established.
They succeeded but in drying out their ground they also dried hundreds of farming water wells sourced by the same underground reservoir.

This included my own ex-windmill well whose pure fresh water does/did my garden proud.

Obviously the farming community went into uproar and had the drainage halted.

The water soon flowed back but now at a rate at least double that before. While oil exploration is abhorred on the Baleares what caused the increase is the much maligned drilling technique of fracking. In this case more accurately reverse fracking opening up the water routes through what appears to the layman as solid rock by rapidly emptying the fissures pulling in water and flushing out any debris leaving the fractures cleaner and effectively larger.
My lawns are glowing again.  

Mike Lillico
Playa de Palma