More than three years after a court ruling that left a group of young women hopeful that their legal action had helped “restore nature” for future generations in Ecuador, a report by Amnesty International on Monday found that gas flaring that the Provincial Court of Justice of Sucumbíos had ordered to be eliminated has actually continued—threatening public health and a just energy transition.
In its report, titled The Amazon Is Burning! The Future Is Burning!, Amnesty found the Ecuadorian government and public and private oil companies have avoided “any concrete and ambitious steps to remove the flares,” instead taking measures that will allow them to “maintain oil production at all costs.”
Following a legal action brought by nine women and girls from Sucumbíos and Orellana, supported by the Union of People Affected by Texaco’s Oil Operations (UDAPT), the court ruled in January 2021 that Ecuador had ignored the rights that the plantiffs had to live in a healthy environment, and ordered that gas flares be shut down with officials prioritizing the removal of flares near population centers.
The flares burn natural gas, a byproduct of oil extraction—long a top industry in Ecuador—and the air pollution it causes has been linked to health problems including cancer.
A 2017 study by Clínica Ambiental found higher incidences of cancer among people who lived near oil facilities and gas flares in the Ecuadorian Amazon. A lawyer representing the women and girls and UDAPT also said two years of research had found 251 cases of cancer in Sucumbíos and Orellana, with women accounting for 71% of them.
As Amnesty noted, gas flaring is also linked to the emission of super pollutants like methane, which is around 80 times more potent than carbon dioxide in terms of its global heating potential.
Complying with the 2021 ruling in the case against the Ecuadorian Ministry of Energy and Non-Renewable Natural Resources and the Ministry of Environment and Water is a matter of “climate, environmental, and racial justice,” said Ana Piquer, Americas director at Amnesty.
“The Ecuadorian state must put an end to the routine burning of gas in flares, a practice that is today endangering the Amazon, the world and the future of the children who will inherit the planet,” said Piquer.
Amnesty verified that at least 52 gas flare sites are within three miles of population centers, continuing to put local communities at risk despite the provincial court’s ruling.
In a video posted to social media by Amnesty, Evelyn Mora, one of the plaintiffs in the case, said the global community will ultimately be affected by Ecuador’s refusal to comply with the 2021 ruling.
“It’s not just Ecuador it’s affecting,” she said of the oil industries’ continued use of gas flares, “it’s the atmosphere of the entire world.”
Amnesty emphasized that state-owned and private companies in countries including Ecuador, Brazil, Venezuela, and the United States use routine flaring during oil extraction as a cost-cutting measure in marginalized and low-income areas known as “sacrifice zones.”
“By eliminating gas flares and committing to a transition to a fossil fuel-free economy, Ecuador can become a standard bearer for climate and environmental justice for the sake of the planet, now and in the future,” said Piquer. “Oil ‘wealth’ has never reached the Ecuadorian Amazon; rather, the region is a large oil sacrifice zone where children, including the girls and young women in the gas flares case, are one of the most vulnerable population groups.”
The group’s report calls on the Ecuadorian government to take steps including:
- Designing and implementing a plan to eliminate the use of gas flares as soon as possible to comply with the 2021 ruling;
- Accelerating the removal of gas flares within three miles of population centers and requesting the necessary technical assistance to prevent methane leakage and other emissions;
- Phasing out fossil fuels and transition to renewable energy in a manner consistent with human rights by 2030, respecting the rights of oil industry workers; and
- Working with the Indigenous peoples of the Amazon to develop plans in accordance with their values and providing them with the necessary means to implement them.
Piquer credited “the courageous girls and young women plaintiffs in the gas flares case” with showing the global community “that children and young people around the world are urgently demanding climate, racial, and gender justice, as well as radical changes for human rights and nature.”
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