Af-Energy-Exclusion-Amazon-11-05
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Executive Coordinator at Idec Editing Teresa Liporace Clara Barufi Joint Coordinator of the Xingu Graphic design Project at ISA Coletivo Piu (@coletivopiu) Paulo Junqueira Support Coordinator of the Energy and Charles Stewart Mott Sustainability Program at Idec Foundation Clauber Barão Leite Partnership Technical production Instituto Socioambiental – ISA Camila Cardoso socioambiental.org Clauber Barão Leite Published by Marcelo Silva Martins Instituto Brasileiro de Defesa Mayara Mayumi Tamura do Consumidor – Idec Munir Younes Soares idec.org.br Priscila Morgon Arruda São Paulo, May 2021 Index 04 Presentation 06 Executive summary 08 1. Introduction: Legal Amazon 12 2. Covid-19 pandemic impacts in the region 17 3. Energy aspects of the Legal Amazon 19 3.1 The Amazon Isolated Systems 21 3.2 The electricity access exclusion and the Amazon peoples’ development challenges 26 4. The Xingu Indigenous Territory Case: An Example of Challenges to be Faced 30 4.1 Xingu Solar Project 36 5. Idec and ISA recommendations 40 6. References Presentation he Brazilian Institute to clean and sustainable energy, for Consumer in the scope of the public policy T Defense (Instituto aim to universalize access to Brasileiro de Defesa do modern energy services. – Idec) and the Consumidor The Covid-19 pandemic has put Socio-environmental Institute in relief how the lack of electric (Instituto Socioambiental – ISA) energy access weakens the are members of the Energy conditions of life mainly among and Communities Network the Indigenous populations. The (Rede Energia e Comunidades), service availability in the region formed by a group of represents not only a quality of organizations that develop life improvement alternative, but model clean energy projects also the minimal conditions to with and for the sustainable improve community resilience in development of traditional and the matter of health. Indigenous people.1 This report proposes an initial These model projects contribute discussion about the urgency to isolated community access and the challenges to provide 1. For more information, please see the link: https://www.energiaecomunidades.com.br/. 4 Energy Exclusion and Resilience of Amazon People the service. The text is divided toward renewable energy access into four parts. The introduction and the pandemic. Finally, based shows the region’s main on the evidence presented, the characteristics, the impacts of proposed aspects that should be the pandemic on Indigenous considered for implementation of populations and the measures universalization of electric energy adopted, by highlighting access policies in the region in the public electrical energy the years to come are shown. services, to facilitate redesigning healthcare services and to provide improved resilience for these people. The next section broaches the electrical energy characterization of the isolated Teresa Liporace system and the challenges where Executive attention is needed. The third Coordinator at Idec section presents The Xingu Indigenous Territory (Território Paulo Junqueira Indígena do Xingu – TIX) case, Joint Coordinator of the pointing out the mobilization Xingu Project at ISA 5 Executive Summary he Covid-19 pandemic has addressed, with the creation of the put in relief the vulnerability More Light for the Amazon Program T of people who live in the (Programa Mais Luz para a Amazônia remote regions of the Legal Amazon. – MLA). Estimates show that there are The lack of access to essential presently about one million people services such as electric energy with no access to modern electric is associated with higher levels of energy in the region. deaths caused by the disease in the It is important to highlight that a large region, as compared to the rest of part of the Amazon is not connected the country. This scenario shows to the electrical transmission lines of the urgency to promote universal the National Interconnected System access to modern energy service (Sistema Interligado Nacional – SIN). in the region. After all, besides Electricity in the municipalities and improving the quality of life, electrical localities where it already exists is energy can help in confronting the therefore rendered by means of public health crisis and supporting isolated generation systems. Most community resilience. of these municipalities use diesel- Brazil undertook a great deal of fuel generators. These systems have meaningful effort in favor of electric high generation costs, low efficiency universalization in past years. The and an expensive maintenance Light for All Program (Programa needs, besides involving complex Luz para Todos – LpT) brought fuel transportation logistics and benefit to a total of 16.5 million emissions of greenhouse gases. On people between 2004 and mid 2019 the other hand, the use of diesel according to Brazilian Central Power fuel in the region is widespread. The (Centrais Elétricas Brasileiras S.A. – supply chains are well structured and Eletrobras) data. But the challenges the commercialization of this fuel for remote communities in the Legal generates state income by means of Amazon only now have begun to be tax collection. 6 Energy Exclusion and Resilience of Amazon People Notwithstanding, projects developed by The Socio-environmental Institute in the Xingu Territory region show that decentralized, clean and low- impact energy sources, including consultation protocols, to assure photovoltaic energy, are the options the services rendered match the with a greater feasibility to serve the community demands and people, due to the relative ease of take into consideration the existing technological appropriation by the socio-cultural diversity. communities, because most of their The universalization policy would needs refer to intermittent usage also enable the access to energy and the model does not present services that are safe, sustainable and difficulties to the families’ daily with low environmental impact, by activities. The results of experiments guaranteeing enough energy to meet such as these reinforce the need to the household and the communities’ consider renewable energy sources in productive needs. The establishment new policies for the region. of a robust training and capacity Considering these experiences and building program can guarantee that peculiarities, as well as the urgency the people who live in the area are to expand regional electrification, trained to take responsibility for the the Brazilian Institute for Consumer systems operation and management. Defense and the Socio-environmental Furthermore, public policy should Institute have proposals for rapid integrate the overall sustainable and high quality implementation. development of isolated communities, Such proposals, in particular, are including such necessities as health, initial contributions, based on the education, housing, basic sanitation, discussions promoted by the Energy communication and food security. and Communities Network, as well as The recommendation involves public debate on the subject. the need for a totally transparent The proposals include the timeline and established targets, accomplishment of mapping all including criteria for the energy communities in remote areas, with no utilities, with frequent monitoring and access whatsoever to energy and the accountability, as well as conclusion preparation of an updated national dates so that the universalization of rural electrification plan. Such a plan clean energy access in the Amazon should be based on the communities’ region can be fully achieved. 7 8 he Brazilian (Superintendência de Amazon region is Desenvolvimento da Amazônia T territorially defined – Sudam) area of activity.2 In its as the Legal Amazon, which entirety, the region comprises corresponds to the Amazon 58.9% of the Brazilian territory Development Superintendent (see Figure 1) (1). Figure 1. Legal Amazon characterization - Source: IBGE (2019) 2. Sudam – the Amazon Development Superintendent’s area of activity is set forth in Art. 2 of Complementary Law no. 124, of January 3, 2007. Sudam’s purpose is to promote the economic integration of the region constituted by 52 municipalities of Rondônia, 22 do Acre, 62 of Amazonas, 15 of Roraima, 144 of Pará, 16 of Amapá, 139 of Tocantins, 141 of Mato Grosso and 181 of Maranhão, located West of Meridian 44 (of which 21 of them are partially integrated into the Legal Amazon). It has a surface area of 5.015.067,749 sq/km. 9 The Amazon shows a far- reaching socio-cultural diversity. Such a diversity is due to the intense migration of populations from other regions and, most importantly, due to the great diversity of Indigenous People and of other traditional populations. At the start of this decade, there were 411 Indigenous above, is equivalent to almost Lands (Terras Indígenas – TIs) 60% of the national territory. in the Legal Amazon, and the The population’s income and the area corresponds to 21.7% of Human Development Index (HDI) its territory and has 173 people, are lower than the rest of the representing a total population country, according to Table 1 (3). of approximately 250 thousand According to data of Municipal people (2). Human Development Index Generally, the region shows low (MHDI) of the United Nations demographic density. The totality Program for the Development of its population corresponds (PNUD), among the ten to about 12% of the Brazilian municipalities with the lowest population distributed in an area HDI, all of them are located in the that, according to the illustration Legal Amazon