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What is the point of gauging the
environmental impact of a dam before it is built? Not a lot, if a row
over a proposed hydroelectric scheme in Belize is anything to go by.
A group of leading biologists reckon the Chalillo dam would destroy an
area of rainforest containing rare and threatened species. But the
companies that commissioned the biologists' report are not following its
recommendation that the dam should not be built, one of the report's
authors told New Scientist.
The dispute has highlighted growing concerns over the value placed on
"environmental impact assessments". Last year, a report by the World
Commission on Dams warned that recommendations about whether a
dam should go ahead are no longer welcomed - contrary to the intention
when EIAs were introduced in the 1970s.
Instead, EIAs have evolved into devices "to render dams acceptable when
the decision to proceed has already been taken" by recommending ways to
lessen their impact, says the commission.
"Ignored or rubbished"
Scientists from the Natural History Museum in London conducted an EIA of
the proposed dam project, which is scheduled to start construction in
January in the former British colony of Belize in Central America. In
their official report, the researchers say that the Chalillo dam would
do irreparable harm to one of the most biologically rich and diverse
regions left in Central America, and they "highly recommend" that the
scheme be dropped.
"What is the point of scientists undertaking environmental assessments
if they are ignored or rubbished rather than being taken into proper
consideration?" asks Alastair Rogers, a co-author of the report.
The proposed 35-metre dam is to be built on a remote stretch of Belize's
Macal River and produce electricity for the surrounding provinces. It
would flood 11 square kilometres of the river's pristine forested flood
plain in remote mountains near the border with Guatemala.
The area contains rare species such as jaguar, Baird's tapir, Morelet's
crocodile, ocelot, howler monkey and a population of 60 to 100 scarlet
macaws--a subspecies of parrot of which fewer than a thousand remain
worldwide. The report says the dam would "cause a rapid reduction and
probable eventual extirpation" of the birds.
Draft report
The Canadian arm of the British engineering firm AMEC, a consultant on
the construction of the $30 million project, commissioned the Natural
History Museum to analyse the impact of the dam on wildlife as part of a
wider EIA. The company has shunted its 105-page report into an appendix
to the five-volume assessment, prefaced with a warning
saying that it is "a draft report, and readers should formulate their
conclusions accordingly".
But Rogers told New Scientist: "There are many scientists who are deeply
concerned about this project and believe the facts speak for
themselves." Rogers, a colonel in the British Royal Marine Reserve, has
led five scientific expeditions to the dam region.
AMEC denies trying to bury the report. Fortis, the Canadian company that
runs Belize's electricity industry and will own the dam, says that the
report contains significant inaccuracies, including false claims that
several species are endangered. The scientists deny this.
Fortis chief executive Stanley Marshall also recently claimed on
Canadian radio that "from the time this report went to Britain it has
been continuously leaked to environment groups and influenced by them".
But Rogers denies that activists have influenced the report. In a letter
to the Belize government in September he said: "It is absolutely clear
that constructing a dam at Chalillo would cause major, irreversible
negative environmental impacts and destroy many important archaeological
sites."
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