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1492
Columbus sails west: El Hierro discovered
Before Columbus sailed past El Hierro in 1492, the island was considered the most westerly point of land on Earth. When Ptolemy (90AD-168AD) developed the idea of a prime meridian in the second century, he drew the first line through what we now call the Canary Islands. Following Ptolemy’s lead, map makers from the second to the sixteenth centuries placed El Hierro at the end of the known world. -
1546
Sailors arrive ashore El Hierro and give the islanders a portrait of the Virgin Mary
In the island legends, the beloved portrait of the Virgin Mary, Virgen de los Reyes, came to El Hierro with the wind. In 1546, sailors drifting for days in calm water off the coast of El Hierro went ashore and gave the islanders an image of the Virgin Mary that they had been carrying for delivery to the New World. At that moment, the winds picked up and the sailors were finally able to sail away to the New World. -
El Hierro works to become first energy-independent island powered by renewable energy sources
Since 1996, El Hierro has worked steadily at becoming the first energy-independent island in the world that is powered only by renewable energy sources. They did it by coming together and—with help from neighbors in the Canary Islands, Spain, and the European Union—directing their scientific know-how, moral will, and spiritual commitment toward meeting their energy needs with nature, not from nature. -
The Gorona del Viento El Hierro consortium was formed
The Gorona del Viento El Hierro consortium was formed in 1996. It included islanders, faculty and students from the Canary Islands Institute of Technology, consultants from Spanish utility company Endesa, and representatives of the Spanish government. All participants were fixed on shifting the island’s energy source from diesel-powered generators that used 6,600 tons of diesel fuel and emitted 8,700 tons of CO2 yearly to a wind and water turbine farm that uses no fossil fuels and emits no CO2. -
UNESCO named El Hierro a Biosphere Reserve
El Hierro has an incredibly diverse landscape and a great variety of plant and animal life. From volcanic cones and solidified lava flows, to pine forests and lush grasslands, El Hierro is home to rare animal species like the White-tailed Laurel Pigeon and the giant Galliotia Sim lizard. In 2000, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) named El Hierro a Biosphere Reserve, thus protecting 60% of the island’s pristine territory. -
Spanish Minister of Industry gave the multinational oil company Repsol permission to drill near Canary Islands.
In August 2014, the Spanish Minister of Industry gave the multinational oil company Repsol permission to drill three exploratory deep-water perforations in the ocean seabed near the Canary Islands. The Canary Islands is one of the largest marine areas in Europe and is among the most spectacular areas on Earth for marine biodiversity. Such a disaster would affect not only the Islands’ marine biodiversity, but also its source for drinking water and its tourism and commercial fishing industries.
