The administrator of the Empresa de Generación Eléctrica Punta Catalina (EGEPC) affirmed that the supervision of the environmental parameters of the electric park has the technical supervision of a renowned international firm that reports to the banks financing the work.
In front of an audience made up of environmentalists, community members and researchers –who circulated a study alleging contamination by the plants–, the businessman Celso Marranzini invited them to learn about the reports periodically made by the firm specialized in environmental monitoring, RINA
Marranzini, who attended the publication of the aforementioned study as a guest, took notes about the findings and, in a turn to speak, defended the importance of the energy infrastructure for the stability of the system, showing himself open to corrections with the purpose of improve its performance from the environmental point of view and carry out the necessary remediation.
Although he acknowledged that Punta Catalina has an environmental impact like all operations of its nature, he clarified that there are industries, transportation, and electricity generators located in the vicinity of the thermoelectric power plant, on the southern coast “whose emission is not zero.” “Let’s not just look at Punta Catalina,” he said.
He maintained that he is focused on solutions and that is why he is managing that the ships that transport coal to the port of Punta Catalina take the ashes, which are currently handled “in an environmentally safe way, minimizing the risks of pollution.”
He stated that the ashes generated by the two generating plants that make up the power plant are a potential business that will report income. He asked the industry to be encouraged to create ecological block factories that, using these wastes, can contribute to a better economy in construction.
Regarding the petitions in the sense that Punta Catalina be converted to natural gas, he warned that, if that had happened at this time, the maintenance of the generators within the system “would be unaffordable.”
He stressed that, today, the low cost of energy production from the use of mineral coal makes the plants occupy the first places in order of merit of the National Interconnected Electric System (SENI).
The study was put into circulation by the Coalition for the Defense of Health and the Environment of the Peravia Province, the National Committee to Fight Climate Change and the Institute of Lawyers for Environmental Protection.