Council for the Strategic Development of Santiago begins monitoring the Las Placetas project

This EGEHID release was published using machine translation.

Santiago, Dominican Republic.- The Council for the Strategic Development of the City and Municipalities of Santiago (CEDS) launched the monitoring and follow-up system for the implementation of the Las Placetas hydroelectric project.

The purpose of this methodological technical support is to verify that the construction of the aforementioned project complies with the criteria that ensure the sustainability and biodiversity of the hydrographic basins.

This process, which is also made up of the Santiago Aqueduct and Sewerage Corporation (Coraasan), the Provincial Government and other organizations that bring together the CDES, intends to offer the Dominican Hydroelectric Generation Company (Egehid), in charge of the project, timely information so that physical and hydraulic works comply with environmental sustainability standards.

Egehid, in the person of its general manager, engineer Rafael Salazar, expressed his satisfaction at being able to count on a strong institution with a history of work such as the Council for the Strategic Development of Santiago, which will allow Las Placetas, more than a clean energy generation project, becomes a strategic project for the development of this province, the area of La Sierra and the entire region in general.

The CDES will verify and validate that the project is developed in light of the vision of the Santiago 2030 Development Plan.

Ricardo Fondeur, president of the CDES, thanked Egehid and the President of the Republic, Luis Abinader, for the trust placed in that organization and said that the goal is for this to be a project for life, given the significant investment and benefits that it will bring to the country, that go beyond energy, such as the supply of drinking water to areas with deficiencies, contributing to public health, plus its socioeconomic impact.

He explained that the construction of a dam, in addition to the multiple benefits, also produces a socio-environmental impact that can be very relevant at the local and regional level, so they will base their intervention on five thematic axes, which are: social and community inclusion , land use and land use planning, environmental sustainability, economy and competitiveness.

Coraasan's participation in this accompaniment will be through its ISO 9001 certified laboratories, which will allow surveys and monitoring of the water, to ensure its quality. As its director Andrés Burgos explained, the intention is that the quality of the waters does not decrease with this project, but rather increases. "To ensure that it is a viable project for the province and therefore for the country," Burgos emphasized.

The director of the Social Cabinet and president of the Administrative Council of Egehid, Dr. Rosa Ysabel Ruíz, who has been at the forefront of the project's socialization meetings with different sectors, specified that the company's interest is not to act unilaterally, nor interventionist , but from a contextual theme served by the community itself, supported by sustainability organizations, which guarantees the continuity of development.

The act of launching this oversight agreement was held at the CDES headquarters, with the participation of the provincial governor Rosa Santos, who highlighted the importance of the Las Placetas hydroelectric complex for the socioeconomic development of the area. Other executives from Egehid and CDES attended.