Contamination and impunity after a year of ecological disasters due to oil spills in Ecuador and Peru


Fifteen days after the start of 2022, Peru experienced one of the worst environmental disasters registered in the territory: the spill of about 12,000 barrels of crude oil by the refinery The Pampilla SAA Both this situation, which occurred in the peruvian coastssuch as the one registered in the Ecuadorian Amazon Rainforestonce again revealed the vulnerability of ecosystems to these events that often repeat themselves frequently.

More than a year after the oil spill in Repsol In the Ventanilla Sea, the company affirms that the conditions are right for fishing, recreational and commercial activities; however, according to the last monitoring of the Agency for Environmental Assessment and Enforcementas of October 2022, there are still 69 areas affected with hydrocarbons between beaches, points and cliffs.

Employees work to clean up the coast of Cavero beach, affected by the oil spill involving the Spanish energy giant Repsol. Photo: AFP

“According to the studies that the Repsol company has contracted and paid for, everything is clean. But, according to official studies, (…) the latest study we have is from October by OEFA, and it basically says that almost seventy places are still dirty with hydrocarbons and not clean, as the company says,” he says. to this newsroom Daniel Olivares, vice president of Oceana Peru and former congressman from Lima.

Neither repair nor rehabilitation

In addition to investigations self-financed by the company that intend to cover the consequences of this ecocide in the national territory, where thousands of animals were affected by the oil, including mammals, birds, fish, crustaceans, and at least 2,500 fishermen and hundreds of workers in coastal areas lost their livelihood overnight, a complete reaction has not been seen to deal with an emergency of this magnitude.

“We have no information that rehabilitation plans have begun in the places and they have also paid for advertorials in the country’s main media to make it appear that everything is clean,” says Olivares. Likewise, he adds that “the signals given by the company are not those given by one that understands the responsibility it has”, an attitude that he affirms has been a constant from the beginning.

Like Peru, Ecuador began 2022 with a oil spill of at least 6,300 barrels due to the rupture of the Heavy Crude Oil Pipeline (OCP), as a consequence of the regressive erosion of the Coca River, to which experts attribute that it would be due to a failure in the construction of the Coca Codo Sinclair Hydroelectric, flagship work of the Government of Rafael Correa.

“(…) bad technologies or lack of maintenance of this pipeline that carries crude from the Amazon to the coast, and it is also an area that has many natural threats: a lot of heavy rains, there are earthquakes, volcanism,” he explained to DW Nicolás Cuvi, research professor at FLACSO in Ecuador.

“On the other hand, you have to understand that the great oil pipeline that burst occupies a vast territory and is much more visible, but in the oil fields, in the small pipelines, spills occur permanently,” he adds.

Pollution from oil spill near Coca, Sucumbíos, in Ecuador

Contamination from an oil spill near Coca, Sucumbíos, in Ecuador. Photo: DW

After this fact, a series of constitutional sentences issued also at the beginning of last year were expected. However, as of today, these are not met, as reported by Mongabay.

The medium, known for covering the most important environmental stories in Latin America, indicates that what is worrying about this situation is that these decisions set precedents on the rights of nature and animals, as well as the consent of indigenous peoples and nationalities.

For this reason, the Ecuadorian indigenous movement has not stopped insist on its compliance during the dialogue tables promoted as an exit to the national strike last June.

Countries like Ecuador are “on the ropes,” María Fernanda Espinosa, an Ecuadorian diplomat and former president of the United Nations General Assembly, told The New York Times. A developing country that considers that oil extraction is the best solution to its problems, generating the exploitation of some of the most biodiverse regions in the world.

The oil industry in Ecuador insists that new extraction projects can be developed without causing much damage, but according to The New York Times, scientists say that even the best cases so far have led to unexpected deforestation and other environmental damage.

Public policies to counteract the damage

Regarding the actions to be taken by the Peruvian State, Olivares commented: “At Environment and Produce, there must be updated information to know what is dirty so that the company can continue cleaning and put an end to the uncertainty in the public that is linked to activities economic in the area.

In the case of Energy, he indicated his work as a supervisory entity so that “rehabilitation plans” are “complied with” in the area, as well as the work from the Ministry of Health in caring for the population that has been exposed to severe contamination: ” We do not have a differentiated allocation of resources to attend to the objective population in the area, it is as if the socio-environmental disaster had not existed or to monitor people on a recurring basis, as a reaction and immediate attention”.

Source-larepublica.pe