📋 Tender Overview
Senator Nunez and Senators De Urresti and Velasquez will request a series of letters to make information transparent that will expedite the necessary efforts to leave years of pollution and its effects on the ecosystem in the past.
Requesting a series of letters from the Ministries of Science and Environment, and the Comptroller General of the Republic, were some of the agreements adopted by the , after knowing the results of the application of the Atmospheric Decontamination Plan (PDA) of Calama. Senators Alfonso De Urresti as president of the aforementioned body, Senator Paulina Nunez and Senator Esteban Velasquez, both representatives of the Antofagasta region, arrived to said commune to learn about the reality experienced by the inhabitants of the Loa River basin and its surroundings. In the session that took place in the hall of honor of the Municipality of Calama, its mayor, Eliecer Chamorro, spoke; the head of the municipalitys Environment Department, Yery Luza; the leader of the National Federation of Residents FENAPO Calama, Sergio Chamorro; the leader of the Loa Defenders Corporation, Francisca Oliva; the representative of the Yalquincha community, Ignacio del Castillo; the regional director of the Biodiversity and Protected Areas Service of Antofagasta, Gustavo Riveros; and the head of the Air Quality division of the Ministry of the Environment, Cristian Tolvett. They all provided details about the inefficiency that the PDA has had considering that 16 years have passed since its installation and the pollution rates still classify the commune as a saturated zone. In this regard, the different actors delved into the effects that the large amount of mining tailings that produce oxide nitrate has had on the health of the population; the evolution of the plan through the different administrations; the observations made by the Comptrollers Office on the application of this instrument; Codelcos role in the management of its deposits; the changes observed in the flow of the Loa River, the urban wetland and the Calama oasis; the danger that this pollution represents for the care of the extinct Loa frog; and the need to reclassify priority sites. Along these lines, Senator Nunez and her peers De Urresti and Velasquez offered to send letters to the authorities in the case to expedite compliance with the plan. Thus, they agreed to notify the Ministry of Science to announce the funds for which the Conservation Center of the area can apply given the difficulties they have in developing their research. They will also request information from the Comptrollers Office about the provisional measures adopted (installation of green areas and paving) these years, which in the opinion of those affected have only postponed substantive solutions. The Ministry of Education and Codelco will also be asked to support the publication of a permanent text about the environmental protection actions carried out by the Conservation Center; and to the Ministry of National Assets to update information on illegal occupations in the Loa River.
