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 "Part of our job is trying to educate people in Brazil about
the enormous impact dams have caused in terms of
expelling people from their homes and destroying biodiversity."
By Conrad Johnson
The man with the biggest job in the electric sector in Brazil is Glenn Switkes. This
American's job is not in generation or distribution; he runs the Latin American office for
the International Rivers Network. The I.R.N., a Berkeley, California-based NGO, has only
one office outside the US. From São Paulo Mr. Switkes supervises the spending of about 10
percent of the organization's yearly expenditures of $1,500,000, all meant to protect the
world's largest hydrological resources and the citizens who live closest to them.
The funding is modest, but the job is the world's largest. Ninety five percent of
Brazil's usable energy on any given day is river reservoir generated. Brazilian engineers
claim that more than 70 percent of the country hydroelectric potential is yet to be
harvested. In short, if river conservation is your goal, it is in Brazil that the most
resources need protecting.
Our interview was initially delayed because Mr. Switkes needed to attend to a
professional problem in the Brazilian North. An indigenous leader living near and opposing
the controversial 11,000 MW Belo Monte dam site on the Xingu River (one of ten Amazon
tributaries larger than the mighty Mississippi) was assassinated in his own home, most
likely by political enemies. "Brazil's mania for mega-projects is supported by
corrupt local officials eager to grab short-term profits from these boom and bust
projects, and willing to have killed anyone who gets in their way," Mr. Switkes
explained.
Brazzil: What have been your organizations largest accomplishments in Latin
America?
Switkes: The issues in Latin America, especially Brazil, are so large they never go
away. Our principal function seems ever to be the same: helping to build and
professionally inform local and regional groups that are resisting economic development
that improper use of water resources affects the ecology of rivers and the people who live
with and rely on those rivers. Largely we help local activists, on a continuing basis, get
the technical information and legal arguments they need to accomplish their purposes.
Brazzil : Are the fights mostly about the environmental and human impacts of dams
sited for electric generation purposes?
Switkes: No, hydrovias or transportation projects for agricultural products have
been an equal or larger concern. Some of the richest and most unique ecologies in the
world like the Pantanal of Mato Grosso and the Bananal Island on the Araguaia in Tocantins
face destruction by industrial (or river channelization) projects on respectively the
Paraguay, Araguaia, and Tocantins Rivers. We hope to be as successful there as our allies
have been in opposing the U.S. Corps of Army Engineers on the Mississippi. Studies have
shown these industrial transportation projects do not provide cheaper transportation for
soybean exports than other means such as existing rail lines.
Of course new Amazon basin electric projects like Belo Monte, especially since they are
being heavily resisted by indigenous peoples and where transmission lines will need to
cross over 1000 kilometers of the Amazon to reach connections to the North-South trunk are
important too. Tucuri displaced 40,000 people; Balbina near Manaus flooded 2400 square
kilometers of Amazon rainforest to produce a mere 250 megawatts of
electricity—virtually no energy in the dry season. The 800 families that took refuge
on islands in the Tocantins created by the Tucuri reservoir are now threatened because
Eletronorte wants to raise the reservoir depth another 2 meters. As I said, the issues
never go away and we have been drawn somewhat into the question of Environmental Impact
Statements for thermo generation of late.
Brazzil: How is that?
Switkes: Brazil is new to the question of air pollution. Brazilian state, local and
federal environmental authorities have been right to question some licenses for the
`Emergency Thermo Plan' because some natural gas generation is planned for urban areas
that already have serious air quality problems. Some of our critics see us as
anti-development but that isn't true. We know where to get the mostly volunteer
independent experts to do the kinds of studies these problems always entail. Many of
Brazil's reservoirs, especially in the Amazon region, could be highly affected if Kyoto is
for example modified to include methane emissions and not just carbon. Hydroelectric
generation is not as clean as most Brazilians assume.
Brazzil: What about the new small hydroelectric dams?
Switkes: There has been very little local objection to most of these projects.
Where there are local groups who oppose them for environmental or human rights reasons we
help them, but these are usually because of specific local situations such as threats to
an ecological reserve. Unlike the upper Midwest in the States where conservationists
celebrate every time a small dam is removed, small dams are one of the alternatives which
can help Brazil out of its energy crisis.
We at I.R.N. understand Brazil needs electric energy to develop economically, and
frankly the rationing programs is welcome because it may make us all more conservation
conscious in the long run. There is also much inefficiency in the transmission and
distribution systems; more investment there could save needless loss, some of our experts
say, equal to the value of a year's production at Itaipu.
Brazzil: What about the future for Brazilian water and hydroelectric management?
Switkes: From our point of view it is in the strengthening of civil society and
particularly institutions and groups outside the structures of party politics. Even
opposition political parties, like the PT [Workers' Party], tend to accept
hydroelectricity as the cheapest and cleanest form of energy available. Part of our job is
trying to educate them as well, about the enormous impact dams have caused in terms of
expelling people from their homes and destroying biodiversity.
Tucuri was built to serve the aluminum business, not to address the needs of the
20,000,000 Brazilians, mostly rural, without reliable electric service. Good water and
energy management is not incompatible with market economies properly regulated, and with
transparent and democratic energy planning. That is certain. Much progress needs to be
made getting industry to pay their fair shares; one of the reasons electric service is not
universalized is that political authority has thought it more important (even found it
personally more profitable) to subsidize industry in the name of economic growth. Energy
intensive industries use about 40 percent of Brazil's energy and are highly inefficient
job producers. Of course, just such policies are why income is more poorly distributed in
Brazil than in any other major country.
Brazzil: Which are the present groups you believe are pointing the way?
Switkes: One of the strongest challenges to Brazil's energy policy is coming from
the National Movement of Dam-Affected People (MAB), which played an important role in the
World Commission on Dams two-year studies. MAB has worked with technical experts to
demonstrate that there are cheap and quick ways to provide energy in Brazil and that do
not require destroying rivers. Another important group of actors is the Rios Vivos
coalition, which brings together 300 environmental and alternative development
organizations and indigenous populations from the La Plata Basin. Rio Vivos has been
instrumental in the fight against hydrovias, and now works with groups from the
Mississippi River region to show the interrelationships between problems affecting water
resources in South and North America alike.
Conrad Johnson, the author, is an American attorney, permanently residing in
Brazil. He writes for various publications on development and legal issues in Latin
America. You can reach him at conrad@alternativa.com.br
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