Ecological Transition and Castilla y León sign the mining exploration agreement

The Ministry for the Ecological Transition and the Demographic Challenge and the Regional Government of Castilla y León have signed an agreement to execute the actions of the National Mining Exploration Program (PNEM) 2026-2030 within the autonomous territory. The agreement was signed on October 14, 2026, and is published in this Tuesday’s October 27 Official State Gazette (BOE), via the Resolution of October 15, 2026, from the Directorate General for Energy Policy and Mines (reference BOE-A-2026-22514).

The agreement is inter-administrative in nature and responds to a European obligation: Regulation (EU) 2024/1252 on critical raw materials requires Member States to develop a national exploration program (Articles 19 and 27). The PNEM 2026-2030 was approved by the Council of Ministers on March 10, 2026, and section 5.2 provides for the articulation of collaboration mechanisms with the autonomous communities, with special attention to those whose territory contains the program’s priority geological domains.

The distribution of competencies is the starting point: deposits are public domain assets whose investigation may be assumed by the State (Mining Law 22/1973, of July 21), while Article 71.1.10.º of the Statute of Autonomy of Castilla y León attributes to the community the legislative development and execution of basic legislation regarding the mining regime. The publication comes four days after the BOE announced Royal Decree 845/2026, which establishes the rules for the application in Spain of European regulations on critical raw materials and net-zero technologies.

Four years of validity, no funding, and a semi-annual joint commission

The fourth clause of the agreement is explicit: the agreement “does not entail economic commitments” and falls within the executive competencies of the signing administrations. Its obligations are those of coordination, information, and technical cooperation.

• Validity of four years from registration in the State Electronic Registry of Cooperation Bodies and Instruments (REOICO), extendable for another four.
• Monitoring Commission with two representatives from the regional mining body and two from the General State Administration, chaired by the Sub-directorate General of Mines.
• Ordinary semi-annual meetings, with the possibility of extraordinary meetings at the request of either party.
• It may require the assistance of the IGME-CSIC, the HUNOSA Group, an internal resource of the Administration, or geological and mining research companies.

The text is signed by Joan Groizard Payeras, Secretary of State for Energy, and María González Corral, Councilor for Environment and Energy of the Regional Government. The resolution bears the signature of the Director General for Energy Policy and Mines, Manuel García Hernández.

What each administration contributes

The MITECO, through the General Directorate of Energy Policy and Mines, commits to previously informing the Regional Ministry of any PNEM action in the community, studying its proposals, and requesting a regional report before processing a reserve zone in favor of the State. It will also finance research activities according to Annex I of the program, periodically report on company works funded under Order TED/352/2026, and share the results, reserving confidential information from the mining holders.

The Regional Ministry of Environment and Energy, through the General Directorate of Energy and Mines, shall:

• Report within a maximum period of ten days on any proposed royal decree for the declaration of a reserve zone.
• Provide geological, mining, and environmental cartography and territorial data from the Junta’s information systems.
• Identify mining waste facilities likely to contain technically recoverable raw materials.
• Collaborate in the inspection and surveillance of works initiated by the State.
• Promote collaboration with local entities and affected regions in dissemination and transparency tasks.

A territory already mapped and with its own framework

The precedents invoked by the agreement outline the actual scope of the work. The Junta has carried out prospecting for tin, gold, lithium, and mineralizations in pegmatitic rocks, geochemical analyses in Salamanca, Segovia, León, and Zamora, remote sensor research (IBERSAT), and geological-mining studies in Salientes-Cuevas del Sil, Pino de Oro, Prada-Andiñuela, Candín, and Peña de Francia.

To this is added the Mineral Resources Strategy of Castilla y León 2017-2021, with thirty-three measures, and Law 6/2014, on Industry of Castilla y León, whose Article 30 allows these projects to be declared “priority industrial,” with preferential treatment in processing, expropriations, subsidies, and energy easements. The text also cites the Roadmap for the Sustainable Management of Mineral Raw Materials, approved in August 2022, and the Regional Mining Commission of Castilla y León.

The impact of the agreement is measured on two levels. For the mining municipalities and regions, it activates a state program of geological research upon which extraction projects will later be decided—or not—with transparency as an express commitment but also with confidentiality clauses regarding business data. For the sector, it opens the way for public aid: the 2026 PNEM call, published in the BOE on April 29 (BOE-B-2026-13517), is endowed with 2,000,000 euros, one million for geological-mining research and another for studies on the recovery of extraction waste.

Source: Official State Gazette, no. 266, October 27, 2026, Sec. III, page 143670 (official reference: BOE-A-2026-22514).