Brazil's environment minister said Monday he granted a license for an Amazon hydroelectric dam but attached stringent conditions to protect Indian reservations and nature preserves.
But at least two environmental groups criticized the government's approval of a project that they say fails to safeguard either people or the environment.
The license for the Santo Antonio dam is contingent upon millions of dollars of investments in equipment for fire fighters, environmental police and sewage treatment for the state capital, Porto Velho, Environment Minister Carlos Minc said. The dam is one of two planned for the Madeira river in the Amazon state of Rondonia.
Brazil auctioned off the rights to build the 3,150-megawatt Santo Antonio dam to a consortium including Brazilian conglomerate Odebrecht and Furnas in December. The dam is expected to cost 9.5 billion reals (US$5.9 billion) and go online in 2012.
The environmental groups Friends of the Earth, Amazonia, and International Rivers issued a joint statement later Monday accusing Brazil's environmental protection services of approving a mitigation plan which will do little to lessen the dam's impacts on the region's biodiversity, and on river bank communities, including indigenous tribes living close to the reservoir area.
The granting of the construction license under these conditions will mean additional challenges to the project in the courts, Friends of the Earth said.
