In the early hours of the morning, Greenpeace revealed a surprise message: projecting a series of giant digital images on the side of the Campiche coal-fired thermoelectric plant, in the Quintero-Puchuncaví area, to draw attention to the significant environmental and health threats that thousands of Chileans continue to endure, in the so-called “sacrifice zones” in Chile.
“Our images warn about the deadly situation that Chileans have faced for decades. The Government and the AES Gener company have a shared responsibility, we demand the immediate closure of the plants,” said Estefanía González, Greenpeace Senior Campaigner.
The Environmental NGO highlighted the significant age of the plants, and that the local community have been experiencing their polluting impacts for decades. Greenpeace called for the Government to immediately close the coal-power plants.
“They have turned this area into a true Chilean Chernobyl. It is a recorded fact that there are heavy metals in the soil here, lead in the blood of the neighbors, coal spills, loss of biodiversity and destruction of marine resources. The situation is so serious that the Supreme Court has already warned that this area should be evacuated when air and water qualities deteriorate, ” said Estefanía González.
The Greenpeace action involved the digital projection of a series of giant images, 45 bx 45 meters in dimension, including the phrases: “Is this Cop 25 Climate Summit Venue?” and “Coal is Chile´s Climate Emergency”.
Local community members watched the projections and spoke about the difficulty of their living situation, as neighbours of the coal plant.
“For many years, our constitutional right to live in a pollution-free environment has been systematically violated. What we suffer here on a daily basis is that we are being poisoned. It sounds hard, but it is reality. It’s soon going to be a year since the massive poisonings of 2018 and there is still no clarity about what happened and what led hundreds of our children to be admitted to hospitals. Worst of all, this continues to happen daily with pollution rates that exceed the standards, with coal spills and a life that no Chilean deserves, ” said Katta Alonso, spokewoman of the communities Women on Sacrifice Zones.
Greenpeace pointed out that the recent ‘decarbonization’ plan announced by President Piñera has let-down Chileans. The plan lacks the necessary ambition on climate climate change, failing to set us on course for a maximum global warming limit of 1.5 degrees.
“In practice, with this plan, Piñera has agreed to extend the life of coal plants until 2050 and to condemn thousands of Chileans to continue being poisoned for 30 more years. We want to see a plan that could make us proud to be the host-nation of the COP25 global climate summit. That requires the closure of all coal power plants by 2030 at the latest, and the immediate closure of the oldest, most polluting units.” said Estefanía González for Greenpeace, adding, “We must replace coal by taking advantage of the Chile’s enormous potential for clean, renewable energy.”
Notes
Quintero is a Chilean city and in the Valparaíso Region, 30 kilometers north of Valparaíso.
In 2018 between August and October, more than 1,000 people were hospitalized after inhaling toxic gases from nearby industrial complexes.
Chile is the host nation for the COP25 Global Climate Summit, which takes place at the end of this year in Santiago.
Exige el cierre de las centrales en Quintero-Puchuncaví de manera inmediata y un plan de cierre total de carboneras.