Last Friday, at Città dell’Utopia, Juan Pablo Orrego – international coordinator of the board for Patagonia protection – came to lay the basis for the Italian support to the Patagonia without dams campaign which opposes the construction of five dams right in the middle of Chilean Patagonia.
The project opposed is by the HydroAysén society that, through ENDESA in controlled by ENEL. The plan is to build five dams in the Baker and Pascua river basins and submerge 5910 hectares. The hydroelectric plants would be then matched by a row of electricity pylon to move electricity from the plants to the mining areas in the north, crossing Chile for over 2300 km.
On the one side there is the promise of energy independence reached thanks to clean source like hydroelectric one. On the other, the protection of one of the last pristine macro-areas of our planet.
The dams project seems to be unnecessary since Chile is witnessing a decreasing increment of energy request and it would be a false move in a country with such a great renewable energy potential. Not to mention the opportunity of building five dams in a highly seismic zone …
Another quite important point of the Patagonia without dams campaign concerns water rights. The HydroAysén project is based on water rights taken away from Chilean people during dictatorship and in the first years of the ’90 – basically, river are private property. This situation, even if legal, is ethically unsustainable.
With this campaign, the board for Patagonia protection aims to stop the plan and nationalize back the property of the rivers. To do so, the board asks Italian civil society for help since it can, quite directly through campaigning and ethic share investments, put pressure on ENEL to quit the project and keep Patagonia safe.
Various Italian organizations, among which SCI, are backing the campaign both through further campaigning and going deeply in the study of ENEL investment plans. In the meanwhile, a study of the project’s impact on environment is being undertaken and HydroAysén emissaries are playing havoc trying to get their hands on private land and upsetting local communities social dynamics.
The project opposed is by the HydroAysén society that, through ENDESA in controlled by ENEL. The plan is to build five dams in the Baker and Pascua river basins and submerge 5910 hectares. The hydroelectric plants would be then matched by a row of electricity pylon to move electricity from the plants to the mining areas in the north, crossing Chile for over 2300 km.
On the one side there is the promise of energy independence reached thanks to clean source like hydroelectric one. On the other, the protection of one of the last pristine macro-areas of our planet.
The dams project seems to be unnecessary since Chile is witnessing a decreasing increment of energy request and it would be a false move in a country with such a great renewable energy potential. Not to mention the opportunity of building five dams in a highly seismic zone …
Another quite important point of the Patagonia without dams campaign concerns water rights. The HydroAysén project is based on water rights taken away from Chilean people during dictatorship and in the first years of the ’90 – basically, river are private property. This situation, even if legal, is ethically unsustainable.
With this campaign, the board for Patagonia protection aims to stop the plan and nationalize back the property of the rivers. To do so, the board asks Italian civil society for help since it can, quite directly through campaigning and ethic share investments, put pressure on ENEL to quit the project and keep Patagonia safe.
Various Italian organizations, among which SCI, are backing the campaign both through further campaigning and going deeply in the study of ENEL investment plans. In the meanwhile, a study of the project’s impact on environment is being undertaken and HydroAysén emissaries are playing havoc trying to get their hands on private land and upsetting local communities social dynamics.
