Environmental Viability of Land Transport Infrastructure in the Amazon

The analysis of 14 large-scale federal railroad and highway projects in the Legal Amazon reveals significant gaps in the viability phase of infrastructure concessions. Key issues include the absence of clear procedural rules, a lack of logical and temporal sequencing between Technical, Economic and Environmental Viability Studies (EVTEA) and Environmental Impact Studies (EIA), and severe transparency deficits, with 57% of essential documents unavailable. The document argues that these flaws increase environmental risks and jeopardize project quality. It recommends making EVTEAs mandatory before EIAs and establishing a centralized database for all concession documents to enhance monitoring and risk assessment.

• The viability phase for federal railroad and highway concessions lacks clear procedural rules, leading to inconsistencies where projects do not strictly follow the established life cycle.
• There is no legal requirement for Technical, Economic and Environmental Viability Studies (EVTEA) to precede Environmental Impact Studies (EIA), which undermines the coherence of the viability phase and prevents early socio-environmental risk assessment.
• In practice, some projects have received Preliminary Licenses (LP) based on EIAs before the EVTEA was completed, as seen in the case of BR-153/TO/GO.
• Transparency is severely limited in the viability phase; 57% of the main documents and information for the 14 analyzed infrastructure segments could not be located.
• The lack of transparency extends to the criteria used for approving EVTEAs and the unavailability of approval documents, which hinders the ability of investors and civil society to assess risks.
• Information across government agencies is fragmented and contradictory, with different entities providing conflicting data on project starting points, such as the FICO segment.

APA

Climate Policy Initiative (2021). Environmental Viability of Land Transport Infrastructure in the Amazon. https://www.climatepolicyinitiative.org/publication/environmental-viability-of-land-transport-infrastructure-in-the-amazon/

Chicago

Climate Policy Initiative. Environmental Viability of Land Transport Infrastructure in the Amazon. 2021. https://www.climatepolicyinitiative.org/publication/environmental-viability-of-land-transport-infrastructure-in-the-amazon/.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |author=Climate Policy Initiative |title=Environmental Viability of Land Transport Infrastructure in the Amazon |date=10 June 2021 |url=https://www.climatepolicyinitiative.org/publication/environmental-viability-of-land-transport-infrastructure-in-the-amazon/ |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{climatepolicyinitiative2021environmental, author = {{Climate Policy Initiative}}, title = {{Environmental Viability of Land Transport Infrastructure in the Amazon}}, institution = {Climate Policy Initiative}, year = {2021}, month = jun, url = {https://www.climatepolicyinitiative.org/publication/environmental-viability-of-land-transport-infrastructure-in-the-amazon/}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }