Will directly affect more than 75,000 people, and flood savannas and rainforest
| Location |
Brazil
|
| Total Cost |
US$165.00 million
|
| Dates |
2000
–2004 |
| Status |
Closed
|
The Cana Brava project, financed by $160 million in loans from the Private Sector Department (PRI) of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), consists of the construction, operation, and maintenance of a 450 megawatt hydroelectric power plant and a 50 km 203 kilovolt transmission line located on the Tocantins River, a principal artery of the eastern Amazon River in the Brazilian state of Goias. This is the first of a series of 27 large dams planned by the Brazilian government for the Araguaia-Tocantins river system.
Outside sources estimate that new dams on this river system will directly affect more than 75,000 people and will flood more than 12,000 kilometers of cerrado (savannas) and Amazon rainforest. The Brazilian electricity sector is on record stating that an assessment of the cumulative impacts of the entire dams network should be conducted. However, as of yet the IDB’s Environmental and Social Impact Report for Cana Brava only examines the project as a single dam, rather than one of the many dams planned for this river system.
As a result of construction of the Cana Brava dam, in April 2002 the Tocantins River flooded the reservation of the Avás-Canoeiros people, despite studies previously presented by project developers indicating that the Tocantins would not overrun its banks. Although the project received the IDB’s “Best Project Team” award for “outstanding work with civil society” in October 2001, the project developer has not negotiated resettlement and compensation in an open and transparent manner, and several affected groups remain without compensation. Dam-affected peoples claim that inadequate and delayed compensation and resettlement efforts have been offered to less than 300 of the more than 1,000 families that require some form of compensation.