Tag: Renewable energy

29th July 2014 1410 0

“Brazil has the potential and capacity to develop its energy matrix, keeping it clean, but decreasing the share of hydroelectricity and increasing the share of solar, wind and biomass,” said Maria Cecilia Wey de Brito, CEO of WWF-Brazil, in an interview on SOS Juruena Campaign´s new video launched by WWF-Brazil last June. The testimony strengthens the defense of protected areas, such as the Juruena National Park (AM / TM), which are threatened by the construction of dams.

The new video proposes arguments that take into account all the complexity that exists in building a dam in a given area. “We are working towards an energy plan that considers the environmental, economic, and social complexity in a balanced way for that region. There are alternatives in the search for clean energy sources, of low carbon and that reduce environmental impacts,” she said.

The President of the Chico Mendes Institute for Biodiversity Conservation (ICMBio), Roberto Vizentin, is another expert who appears in the video. In his speech, he stressed the need to “elect spaces that cause reduced social and environmental impacts. The potential that the Amazon represents, we have to reinvent the logic of growth, and ensure that it is obtained under a sustainable basis,” he declared.

#SOSJuruena Campaign’s second video can be seen bellow:

Currently, the Federal Government is considering the possibility of building two dams within the Juruena National Park. If built, hydroelectric reservoirs alone would flood about 40 acres in the Park, in State Parks Igarapés Juruena and Sucunduri, and in the Indigenous lands Apiaká, Escondido and Pontal.

The dams also affect the survival of 42 endangered animal species, or species that exist only in that region, in addition to all the rapids of the Rio Juruena, preventing vital ecological processes for migrating fish, for example.

Understand the campaign

To warn society about the issue, WWF-Brazil released the SOS Juruena Campaign, which provides a petition requesting support from the Brazilian and world population, together, to pressure the government not to allow the construction of dams within the Juruena National Park and to ensure this conservation unit remains intact.

To this date, more than 20,000 supporters from Brazil and several other countries have already signed the document and protested against the construction of the project.

You can also help our campaign. In addition to signing our petition, you can distribute it on your social networks and tell your family and friends to sign it.

Click here to join the movement and sign the petition

Learn more