Ecobreves – CHILE: Hydroelectric Plans Advance in the South

By IPS Correspondents and - - Reprint | | Print |

SANTIAGO, Nov 25 2006 (IPS) - The Comptroller General of Chile granted the Hydro Aysén company a provisional electrical concession to begin studies for the construction of four hydroelectric dams on the Baker and Pascua rivers, in Chile's 11th region of Aysén, 2,000 km south of the capital. The Comptroller set aside the 129 objections presented by the public to the Superintendency of Electricity and Fuels, among them the U.S. multimillionaire Douglas Tompkins. The future electrical transmission lines would pass through land he owns.

Felipe Meneses, attorney for the Aysén Citizen Coalition, which is against the dams because they would flood 10,000 hectares of untouched land, told Tierramérica that the news came as no surprise, and that they would continue filing administrative and legal petitions to prevent the project from materializing.

Hydro Aysén is an umbrella group for the transnational energy company Endesa and the local firm Colbún