• About
    • Which Energy Mix is this?
  • Climate News Network Archive
  • Contact
Celebrating our 1,000th edition. The climate news you need
No Result
View All Result
The Energy Mix
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities
SUBSCRIBE
DONATE
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities
SUBSCRIBE
DONATE
No Result
View All Result
The Energy Mix
No Result
View All Result
  FEATURED
Ex-Fossil Workers Convert Old Oilfields to Solar Farms After ‘Rapid Upskilling’ in Alberta June 29, 2022
London Becomes Biggest City to Sign Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty June 29, 2022
G7 Miss ‘Golden Opportunity’, Walk Back Pledge to Cut International Fossil Finance June 29, 2022
Soaring Fertilizer Prices Could Deliver ‘Silver Lining’ For Emissions, But Farmers Struggle to Limit Use June 26, 2022
BREAKING: UN Nature Summit, the ‘Paris Conference for Biodiversity’, Moves to Montreal in December June 19, 2022
Next
Prev
Home Climate & Society Community Climate Finance

Latin America’s Biggest Wind Farm Courts Rising Tensions

May 16, 2017
Reading time: 3 minutes

Edu3k/Wikimedia Commons

Edu3k/Wikimedia Commons

 

Mitsubishi will invest US$1.2 billion to build Latin America’s biggest terrestrial wind farm in the isthmus of Tehuantepec, one of the windiest places in the Americas. But its local benefits plan has some fence-mending to do with neighbours increasingly disenchanted with the region’s multiplying wind turbines.

Mexico News Daily reports that the state of Oaxaca has licensed a 132-turbine, 400-megawatt wind farm in the municipality of Juchitán. The deal includes a $3.4-million payment to the municipality, dedicated output from two of the turbines for the municipality’s use, installation of 5,242 energy-saving light bulbs in the community, and a promise that household power costs will fall by 35%.

The menu of local benefits reflects both the quality of the wind resource across the isthmus—that narrow bit of the Mexican map just to the left of the jutting thumb of the Yucatan peninsula—and the challenge of securing social licence in a region famous for its often bitter resistance to central authorities. In the last year, Oaxaca’s capital has witnessed large-scale demonstrations and highway blockades over issues as disparate as January’s hike in gasoline prices, and a dispute over teachers’ qualifications.

And Juchitán, as Bloomberg reports at length, is more affected than most communities on the isthmus. Mitsubishi’s will be the fourteenth wind farm within the municipality’s sprawling boundaries. And Bloomberg reports that complaints about the first 13 are mounting.

One is particularly noisome, and in contrast to wind power’s clean image: leaks of lubricating oil from spinning turbines that dribble in brown rivers down towers and spray nearby trees from whirling blade-tips.

The leaks “occur with ‘relative frequency,’” Bloomberg says, citing Gamesa Corporación Tecnológica SA, which made the turbines installed in another Juchitán wind park: what the company describes as “small amounts” of lubricating oil spill “habitually” from its units. Electricité de France, which also has turbines in the area, insisted the oil leaking from its turbines “was classified as ‘not dangerous to the environment.’”

Miguel Ángel Alonso Rubio, head of Spain’s Acciona SA’s Mexican unit, blamed oil leaks at its Juchitán turbines on winds that “can be vicious” for half the year, when it can be dangerous to service the turbines at the tops of towers. “We prefer to have the machine dirty than an employee in an accident,” Alonso said.

But one nearby landowner described the effects of a leak to Bloomberg: “The stench was terrible, like a sort of burned fuel or ammonia. The trees were glistening with oil.”

“You might not think it’s that big a deal for a little bit of oil to end up in the land,” added Bettina Cruz, an activist who lives in Juchitán. “But there are nearly 2,000 turbines here now, and hundreds more are planned in the next few years. The leaks will add up. Right into the land we use for water and food.”

“The majority of people in towns with wind parks are probably still in favour,” Marcelino Nolasco, coordinator of a human rights centre in Oaxaca, told Bloomberg. “But over time, people have seen less benefits than originally promised.” Job opportunities and improvements to roads and schools largely haven’t materialized. “Support is waning, and with every new turbine, it generates more tension.”

The Tehuantepec isthmus possesses an estimated 2.6 gigawatts of wind generation potential. But the technology used to capture that energy has provoked previous complaints from the region’s deeply traditional residents that it has affected the patterns of animal behaviour where turbines are located.



in Community Climate Finance, Environmental Justice, First Peoples, Jobs & Training, South & Central America, Water, Wind

The latest climate news and analysis, direct to your inbox

Subscribe

Related Posts

Keith Hirsche
Jobs & Training

Ex-Fossil Workers Convert Old Oilfields to Solar Farms After ‘Rapid Upskilling’ in Alberta

June 29, 2022
422
Number 10/flickr
International Agencies & Studies

G7 Miss ‘Golden Opportunity’, Walk Back Pledge to Cut International Fossil Finance

June 29, 2022
152
AJEL / Pixabay
Food Security

Windfall Tax on Food, Fossil, Pharma Giants Would Raise $490B to Solve ‘Catastrophic’ Food Crisis: Oxfam

June 29, 2022
58

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

I agree to the Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policy.

Trending Stories

François GOGLINS/wikimedia commons

Corrosion Problem Shutters Half of France’s Nuclear Reactors

June 29, 2022
227
Keith Hirsche

Ex-Fossil Workers Convert Old Oilfields to Solar Farms After ‘Rapid Upskilling’ in Alberta

June 29, 2022
422
Danielle Scott/flickr

Advocate Urges Ottawa to Intervene Before Ontario Builds Highway 413

June 29, 2022
130
David/flickr

U.S. Supreme Court Expected to Gut Emission Controls as Climate Scientists Petition for Plan B

June 26, 2022
1.2k
Number 10/flickr

G7 Miss ‘Golden Opportunity’, Walk Back Pledge to Cut International Fossil Finance

June 29, 2022
152
London Eye UK England

London Becomes Biggest City to Sign Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty

June 29, 2022
131

Recent Posts

AJEL / Pixabay

Windfall Tax on Food, Fossil, Pharma Giants Would Raise $490B to Solve ‘Catastrophic’ Food Crisis: Oxfam

June 29, 2022
58
futureatlas.com/flickr

Ottawa Demands Deeper Fuel Emissions Cuts, Offers Fossils a Double-Dip on Tax Breaks

June 29, 2022
78
Province of B.C./flickr

Comox Joins Municipalities Seeking Ban on New Gas Stations

June 29, 2022
78
/Piqsels

Refocus Agriculture Spending to Cut Emissions, Boost Productivity, OECD Urges Governments

June 29, 2022
29
Jimmy Emerson, DVM/flickr

Public Vigilance Key to Protecting Greenbelts for Climate Resilience, Report Finds

June 29, 2022
36
Miguel V/Wikimedia Commons

Forests Fall Short of Full Carbon Storage Potential, Study Finds

June 29, 2022
64
Next Post
tpsdave / Pixabay

Warming Arctic Sets Stage for Geopolitical Tensions

The Energy Mix

Copyright 2022 © Smarter Shift Inc. and Energy Mix Productions Inc. All rights reserved.

Navigate Site

  • About
  • Contact
  • Privacy Policy and Copyright
  • Cookie Policy

Follow Us

No Result
View All Result
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities

Copyright 2022 © Smarter Shift Inc. and Energy Mix Productions Inc. All rights reserved.

Manage Cookie Consent
To provide the best experiences, we use technologies like cookies to store and/or access device information. Consenting to these technologies will allow us to process data such as browsing behaviour or unique IDs on this site. Not consenting or withdrawing consent, may adversely affect certain features and functions.
Functional Always active
The technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user, or for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network.
Preferences
The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
Statistics
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes. The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
Marketing
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.
Manage options Manage services Manage vendors Read more about these purposes
View preferences
{title} {title} {title}