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dam-l Chile ok's Ralco dam 10 March 2000 (fwd)
I'm hoping this isn't a doubled post.
-D.
Message-ID: <B4F0436F.185D%stewartship@visi.com>
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Outgoing Chile government okays controversial dam
SANTIAGO, March 10 (Reuters) - On the eve of a change government, Chile
on Friday gave final approval to a controversial $480 million hydroelectric
dam project being built by power generator Endesa Chile .
Known as Ralco, the 570-megawatt project has come under legal challenge
from Pehuenche Indians whose lands in southern Chile it would flood.
Construction has been halted on the site since March 1 while Endesa
awaited issuance of the final permits by the government's Comptroller's
Office.
A spokesman for the office told Reuters the project got the final
go-ahead at 2 p.m. (1700 GMT), "giving Endesa the definitive concession for
the construction of Ralco."
Endesa has already sunk $150 million into Ralco, doing basic
construction work ahead of final official approval.
But for the last six months the company has been embroiled in legal
battles forcing a series of stop-start decisions by Endesa's board. Endesa
is the generating arm of Chilean-based Enersis, Latin America's largest
private electric conglomerate.
Construction was initially halted in early September by a civil court
order issued after a group of Pehuenche Indians sued the company on grounds
the dam would flood their lands.
The company resumed construction in October after a court of appeals
overturned the order.
In the latest interruption, Endesa announced in mid-February that it
would again halt construction on March 1, on grounds it needed the
government of President Eduardo Frei, who steps down at the end of his
six-year term on Saturday, to approve final construction and water rights.
Frei's government sat on the key documents for a while before sending
them to the Comptroller's Office for approval in late February -- a move
widely seen as a bid to minimize the political fallout.
Frei is to be succeeded by Ricardo Lagos, of the same center-left
ruling coalition.
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