Links to pages and artifacts relating to the 1999-2006 battle over the Chalillo dam in Belize, as portrayed in The Last Flight of the Scarlet Macaw.
Belize Zoo - The best little zoo in the world.
www.stopfortis.org - This site, maintained by the NRDC, contains an enormous amount of material on the Chalillo battle, including Belizean newspaper articles, Meb Cutlack columns, court documents from Belizean courts and the Privy Council, and dozens of other sources.
Probe International - Canada-based Probe International uncovered the Canadian government's use of international development funds to pay for Fortis' Chalillo environmental assessment. Their site contains dozens of newspaper articles and other sources.
Fortis - Home page of Fortis Incorporated, the Newfoundland-based energy company that built and owns the Chalillo dam.
BEL - Home page of Belize Electricity Limited, the Belizean subsidiary of Fortis.
Meb Cutlack - Belize's most tenacious investigative reporter and columnist.
Belize News - One-stop shopping for Belize's leading news outlets: Amandala, The Reporter, Channel 5, Channel 7, The Guardian, and The Belize Times.
Chalillo case documents - Legal arguments, briefs, court decisions, and affadavits from all the major players.
Privy Council decision - Full text of the January 2004 decision by the Law Lords.
The Cornec Report - Revealed that Fortis had erased a fault line running through the dam site, in the EIA submitted to the Belizean government. This report, prepared for Fortis and the government by an independent geologist, was only released at the eleventh hour at the Privy Council trial. (1.31 MB pdf file)
Secret Contract: For Ralph's Eyes Only - This is the so-called Third Master Agreement, the secret contract drawn up between Fortis Inc. and Belizean finance minister Ralph Fonseca. The contract guaranteed Fortis zero liability in case of dam failure. (8.02 MB pdf file)
EIA: Chalillo Environmental Impact Assessment, Main Report - This is the 333-page Chalillo dam EIA main report, including the executive summary. It was prepared by Amec, the environmental consulting firm, for Fortis, the dam owner, in order to gain environmental clearance from the Belizean government.
EIA: Chalillo Environmental Impact Assessment, Supporting Reports - 4 volumes of supporting documents and reports.
Natural History Museum (London) wildlife report - Buried in the EIA's supporting documents (vol. 2), this report by scientists from London's Natural History Museum clearly stated that the Chalillo dam would wipe out the only known nesting ground of Belize's scarlet macaws, eventually leading to their extirpation.
AMEC - CIDA contract - This contract called for the Canadian International Development Agency, the foreign aid arm of the Canadian government, to pay for Fortis's Environmental Impact Assessment for the Chalillo dam. The contract spelled out Amec's objective in the EIA, which was to interest Fortis in building the dam (and using Amec as the dam contractor), not necessarily to produce a balanced EIA. (691 KB pdf)
AMEC Sustainability Report 2003 - In 2003, after putting out an EIA that justified the building of Chalillo on the grounds that the dam's environmental destruction could be successfully mitigated, AMEC published this Sustainability Report that, on page 12, claimed that their EIA emphasized the exact opposite -- that the dam's devastation could not be mitigated. (1.0 mb pdf)
Economics of the Chalillo Dam - A report by economist John Reid, who runs the numbers on the Chalillo Dam and finds that it doesn't make sense. (127 KB pdf)
GE Least-Cost Study - Sorry, not available yet. This report, prepared for Belize Energy Ltd. by energy consultants at General Electric, was used as the main justification for the Chalillo Dam. Neither BEL nor its parent company, Fortis, have ever released the report to the public.
Vaca Dam Articles & Press Releases - Information on the Vaca Dam, the planned third dam on the Macal River. Construction of this dam, downstream of both Mollejon and Chalillo, has already begun. Activists in Belize have asked that construction of the dam stop until the Chalillo Dam's Environmental Compliance Plan is actually put into effect.
Vaca Dam / Chalillo ECP application for Judicial Review - July 11, 2007, filing by Candy Gonzalez, asking the Belizean Courts to enforce the Environmental Compliance Plan that the owners of the Chalillo Dam promised to implement. The plan includes a warning system to alert residents in San Ignacio and other downstream communities in case the dam fails. To date, that warning system does not exist.
Power rates still a mystery - This page contains documents relating to Candy and George Gonzalez's continuing battle to get full information about the cost of electricity generated by Chalillo.
