Indigenous peoples in Peru’s Amazon demand to be consulted about electricity project that would cut through their territories

Indigenous peoples in Peru are demanding to be consulted about a proposed electricity transmission line that would run for approximately 586 kms through the Amazon. The stated aim of the line is to connect Iquitos in Peru’s northeast, often described as the world’s largest city or town without road or rail access, to the national grid.

Doing so would mean crossing the territories of numerous indigenous peoples, including the Achuars, Kandozis, Kichwas, Kukamas-Kukamirias and Urarinas. Representative organisations are expressing serious concern about the project’s potential impacts and say they have not been consulted about it despite the government’s obligation to do so under Peruvian and international law.

The proposed line would also run through the Abanico del Rio Pastaza, a huge wetlands complex stretching across the border into Ecuador. In 2002 3.8 million hectares of the Abanico were declared a Wetland of International Importance, or Ramsar Site, under the Ramsar Convention, making it the largest Ramsar Site in Latin America and the eighth largest worldwide out of a total of 2,241.

According to ORPIO, an Iquitos-based federation representing 15 indigenous peoples, the potential impacts of the line include the destruction of 874,000 tonnes of trees, the release of 424,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide, massive biodiversity and game loss, conflict, the resettlement of indigenous communities, and encouraging the entrance of colonists, illegal loggers, gold-miners and coca farmers.

ORPIO is taking legal action against the Energy Ministry (MINEM) and government agency ProInversion in an attempt to suspend construction of the line, filing a lawsuit in Iquitos arguing they have not been consulted about it.

“We urge that our request for prior consultation, according to the International Labour Organization’s Convention 169 and other current national and international legislation, is respected, given that the Moyobamba-Ìquitos Transmission Line will directly affect our rights,” ORPIO wrote to MINEM in August.

CORPI, a federation representing nine indigenous peoples, is also demanding that the right to prior consultation, as the process is termed in Peruvian law, is respected.

“[The proposed transmission line] directly affects [indigenous peoples’] collective rights and will impact their access to their subsistence resources and therefore threatens their physical existence, cultural identity, quality of life and spiritual links with the land they have occupied ancestrally,” read a CORPI statement released in February.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest A Kichwa woman from the River Tigre, Peru, demanding in 2015 to be consulted about oil operations. Indigenous people are now requesting to be consulted about the proposed Moyobamba-Iquitos electricity line. Photograph: David Hill

However, MINEM argues that a loophole in a 2012 Peruvian law makes it exempt from doing prior consultation on this occasion. The law states that the “construction and maintenance of public service infrastructure” doesn’t require prior consultation if “it is intended to benefit” and is done “in coordination” with indigenous peoples - and since the proposed transmission line is a “public service” and “would benefit indigenous populations in the project’s area of influence”, MINEM claims no consultation is necessary.

That argument has been dismissed by Peru’s state ombudsman, the Defensoria del Pueblo, which recommended, on 20 May, that MINEM carry out prior consultation. It claims that the legal loophole isn’t applicable in this case because, among other reasons, the proposed line will not directly benefit the indigenous peoples living in the region.

“It’s the population of Iquitos that will be the beneficiary of this project, while the indigenous territories will just be an area through which the transmission line will pass,” the Defensoria’s Daniel Sanchez wrote to MINEM.

MINEM’s response to Sanchez, in August, was that indigenous organizations could have appealed its initial decision to forgo prior consultation, made in October 2015, but didn’t do so. It also argued that its interpretation of the 2012 law is in line with that of the Culture Ministry (MINCU), the ministry responsible for indigenous peoples which - conveniently - issued its own interpretation of the loophole in the 2012 law just seven days after Sanchez wrote to MINEM in May.

To the Guardian Sanchez described MINEM’s interpretation of the law as “loose and wrong”, “perverting” the right to prior consultation and making the process meaningless.

“Prior consultation emerged as a way of promoting indigenous peoples’ participation in projects affecting them [but] I think that a certain sector within MINEM still sees it as an obstacle,” Sanchez says. “So they’re opposed to its implementation. This is counter-productive because it has been shown that what indigenous peoples want is to be taken into account, to influence and above all to participate in decision-making. Of the 17 extractive projects - hydrocarbons, mining and infrastructure - that have been subject to prior consultation to date, not one of them has been opposed by indigenous representatives.”

The opinion that indigenous peoples have the right to prior consultation about the proposed line is shared by lawyer Henry Carhuatocto from NGO IDLADS, which is supporting ORPIO in making its demands heard by the government and media. Carhuatocto calls MINEM’s argument “frankly lamentable” and agrees the line will not directly benefit indigenous peoples but will instead mean clearing almost 600 kms of forest and indirectly facilitate “invaders and colonists.”

“First, we need to make it clear that any legislative or administrative measure affecting the lives of indigenous peoples must be subject to prior consultation,” Carhuatocto told the Guardian. “Second, prior consultation is not an obstacle to economic development, but a space to comply with human rights agreements and an opportunity for the state to take more of an interest in indigenous peoples, to be able to discuss the impacts of the project with them, to reach agreements in good faith, and for them to give their consent. This is an opportunity for the state to do things right by indigenous peoples and we hope that in this instance it doesn’t fail to take it.”

Juan Carlos Ruiz Molleda, from NGO Instituto de Defensa Legal (IDL) which is part of the legal team supporting ORPIO’s lawsuit, makes another argument: that the 2012 law, irrespective of how it is interpreted, is “unconstitutional.” “If you listen to government functionaries, especially those in MINEM, ProInversion and even MINCU, you always hear the same argument: “But that’s what it says in the regulation, that’s what it says in the law.” What’s forgotten, however, is that a law can be unconstitutional and therefore invalid,” Ruiz Molleda wrote in a recent article.

The Environment Ministry (MINAM) has expressed grave concern about the proposed line and, in a report sent to MINEM in February, recommended considering an alternative route that would have less impact on the Abanico del Pastaza. It also stated that the peat bogs in the region, together with those south of the River Maranon, sequester approximately 50% of Peru’s entire carbon reserves, which it called “extremely relevant” “given Peru’s commitments to reduce carbon emissions in order to combat climate change.”

In addition, MINAM’s report argued that Peru’s 1993 Constitution states that treaties form part of national law, meaning that the Ramsar Convention is legally binding on Peru. As a contracting party to the Ramsar Convention, which entered into force in the country in 1992, Peru committed to “desiring to stem the progressive encroachment on and loss of wetlands now and in the future”, and to “promote the conservation” and “as far as possible the wise use” of wetlands.

“The Abanico del Pastaza is one of the best conserved areas in the Peruvian Amazon, home to almost intact animal populations and plants of enormous relevance for the functioning and integrity of eco-systems and for the economy of the indigenous peoples and riberenos living there,” MINAM’s report stated.

The company planning to build the line is Lineas de Transmision Peruanas, owned by Spain-based Isolux Corsán. In May MINEM decided against approving an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) of the project because it failed to adequately address numerous environmental issues, among other reasons, but that decision was appealed by the company and then effectively annulled by Vice-Minister of Energy Raul Perez-Reyes Espejo.

“The Vice-Minister has opened up the possibility that the EIA could be approved,” ORPIO, IDLADS and CORPI announced on 16 August.

The justification for the line, according to the EIA, is that it will be a more efficient and less costly way of providing electricity to Iquitos, allowing residents to enjoy a service similar to other cities in Peru already connected to the national grid.

“Currently, Iquitos’s entire electricity supply comes from its thermal power plant which has a total output of 48.4 MW,” the EIA states. “The oil is transported there by river which means that the supply is subject to high risk because of the difficulties in navigation, weather conditions and environmental implications.”

When Isolux Corsán won the contract in 2014 the then Vice-Minister of Energy, Edwin Quintanilla Acosta, claimed the proposed line would save 38 million gallons of oil a year and “dinamize” the economies of various Amazon regions.

“The Amazon, 130 years after electricity was first used in Peru, will have clean energy to power its economic take-off,” MINEM reported Quintanilla saying. ““That enables us to see the future of the country with great optimism.””

José Serra Vega, an engineer specialising in energy and the environment who has conducted environmental and economic analyses of the proposed line, argues it would be an “environmental disaster.” He claims 8.5 million tonnes of biomass from mostly primary forest could be destroyed, 4.2 million tonnes of carbon dioxide could be released, 1000s of colonists could “invade”, and the territories of eight indigenous peoples would be directly impacted.

Serra Vega claims it would be an “economic disaster” too, estimating it will raise electricity prices and could cost Peruvians over a billion dollars. He says that consumers in Iquitos pay less than in Lima for electricity and another company, Genrent, is already building a new thermal power plant in Iquitos that will have 70 MW capacity - when the city’s current maximum demand is 56MW.

“This line isn’t necessary and will cause a prejudice to Peruvian electricity consumers superior to 600 million dollars during the 30 years of its concession,” Serra Vega told the Guardian.

The EIA states the line will cost approximately US$500 million and take three years to build, with the preliminary stages employing roughly 800-900 people maximum. The project’s “area of direct influence” is estimated at 100 metres along the entire line.

Isolux Corsán’s website states that it acts with “scrupulous respect towards the principles included in the Declaration of Human Rights” and minimises “the environmental impact our activities might occasion.” The company is also a signatory to the UN Global Compact, which means it has committed to, among other things, “support and respect the protection of internationally proclaimed human rights” and “undertake initiatives to promote greater environmental responsibility.”

MINEM and Isolux Corsán did not respond to questions.