Brazil: Lula’s Minister defends oil exploration in the Amazon River

Brazilian Minister of Mines and Energy Alexandre Silveira defended the oil exploration project at the mouth of the Amazon River by Petrobras in a meeting of the Senate Infrastructure Commission on Wednesday, May 24.

For him, it is inadmissible not to “overcome mere bureaucratic issues” imposed by the Brazilian Institute of Environment and Water Resources (Ibama) in denying Petrobras an environmental license.

On Tuesday 23, the Minister of the Environment, Marina Silva, said that Ibama’s decision would be maintained. On Wednesday, Petrobras announced it would ask the institute to reconsider its decision.

Silveira said he was surprised with Ibama’s opinion against oil exploration at the mouth of the Amazon, signed by President Rodrigo Agostinho, because about three weeks ago, the then Director of Licensing, Régis Fontana, had made an opinion favorable to oil exploration in the region.

“There was an opinion from Ibama’s Licensing Director, who has recently left his position, that overcame the opinion of the technicians and pointed the way to a solution for the licensing,” Silveira told the senators.

After Ibama’s decision on Wednesday 17, the Minister phoned Agostinho and made “a ponderation of the importance of synergizing the final decision or studying the possibility of establishing the necessary conditions to overcome this issue.”

“It is unacceptable that we cannot jointly balance economic and social development with the environmental issue,” he declared.

He then defended the idea that a “political component” be considered in Ibama’s decision.

“People say that it is an exclusively technical issue. But there is a political component that always needs to be considered.”

“The technician knows only one subject, to which he has dedicated his entire life, and the politician, less so, but on many subjects, has in his genesis the question of social sensibility because he is in the daily life of society, he knows the regional demands, the difficulties, the suffering of his people”, he defended.

For him, it is also “unacceptable that we are unaware of our mineral potentialities in the country”.

“When discussing energy transition, there is no way to dissociate mining, especially critical minerals. We still depend on fossil fuels.”

The Minister also asked that the requirement to conduct an Environmental Assessment of Sedimentary Area (AAAS) be made only for the new auctions and not for the blocks already granted by the National Petroleum Agency (ANP), as is the case of the mouth of the Amazon River.

“If we start this licensing process again, we will first disrespect the contract, and not only with Petrobras; other oil companies that have won oil blocks there will discuss reimbursement issues with the Federal Government for the resources invested, including royalties,” he said.

In a statement on Wednesday, Petrobras made the same comment about the concession contract.

With information from Revista Oeste

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