SAO PAULO (Reuters) – The Brazilian government would be open to evaluating new hydro power projects in the Amazon region on their merits, as the administration shrugs off \u201cideological\u201d interference in the licensing process, Environment Minister Ricardo Salles said on Monday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Speaking at seminar organized by government relations association Abrig, Salles said environmental agency Ibama is in charge of assessing such projects and the risks associated with them, and it will do so on a strictly technical basis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIt\u2019s important to remember: environmental licensing is not an instrument to say no. It is an instrument to determine under what conditions to say yes.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
The minister said Ibama\u2019s work is to gauge the benefits and risks of each project and at the end of the analysis decide if there are any measures that can be imposed to mitigate the risk, allowing a project to go ahead.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Salles recognized the Amazon \u201cis a sensitive\u201d region because of its biodiversity, noting construction of hydro power projects there is not the same as in other regions of the country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The minister\u2019s stance marks a shift from previous left-wing administrations, during which he said decisions based on \u201cdogmas\u201d compromised protection of the environment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He cited the example of an un-built power line northern Brazil that would connect the state of Roraima to the national grid.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Roraima is supplied by Venezuela, but as a result of a hyperinflationary economic crisis in the neighboring country, the state has been suffering almost daily blackouts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cUnder an environmental standpoint, the worst decision was not approving construction of that power line,\u201d Salles said. He noted in the face of the power outages, Roraima must rely on alternative power sources.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe electricity produced locally [in Roraima] is more anti-environment as it comes from fossil fuel sources,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
SAO PAULO (Reuters) – The Brazilian government would be open to evaluating new hydro power projects in the Amazon region on their merits, as the administration shrugs off \u201cideological\u201d interference in the licensing process, Environment Minister Ricardo Salles said on Monday. Speaking at seminar organized by government relations association Abrig, Salles said environmental agency Ibama is in charge of assessing… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":122,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3530","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3530","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/122"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3530"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3530\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3532,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3530\/revisions\/3532"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3530"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3530"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3530"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}