Qualla: Jatobá Hydroelectric Power Plant

Jatobá Hydroelectric Power Plant: Introduction

Thu, 16 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Wevertoncordeiro, CC BY-SA 3.0. The plan was to build a dam you would not see from shore. No access roads, no worker camps cut into the forest, no highway threading a scar to the construction site. Workers would be flown in and out by helicopter and the land regenerated once the plant was done. It was called the platform approach, and its engineers believed it could reduce the environmental footprint of a major hydroelectric project to almost nothing. The only problem was the reservoir. The water behind the Jatobá dam would cover 64,600 hectares - a flood of Munduruku indigenous territory, ribeirinho river-dwelling communities, and protected forest that no construction method could undo. Since 2017 the project has sat suspended. Not canceled.

Image: Wevertoncordeiro | CC BY-SA 3.0

Jatobá Hydroelectric Power Plant: The Tapajós Plan

Thu, 16 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Brazil_location_map.svg: NordNordWest derivative work: Виктор В (talk), CC BY-SA 3.0. Jatobá is one dam in a much larger proposal. The Tapajós hydroelectric complex envisions 12,000 megawatts of generation spread across seven dams on the Tapajós and Jamanxim rivers. The flagship is São Luiz do Tapajós at 6,133 megawatts. Jatobá would be the second largest, its res...

Image: Brazil_location_map.svg: NordNordWest derivative work: Виктор В (talk) | CC BY-SA 3.0

Jatobá Hydroelectric Power Plant: The People Upstream

Thu, 16 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Wevertoncordeiro, CC BY-SA 3.0. The Jatobá reservoir would sit just upstream of the Sawré Muybu Indigenous Territory, home to Munduruku people whose fight against the larger São Luiz do Tapajós dam became a rallying point for indigenous rights across the Amazon. The Munduruku have lived along the Tapajós for ce...

Image: Wevertoncordeiro | CC BY-SA 3.0

Jatobá Hydroelectric Power Plant: Engineering a Platform

Thu, 16 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Wevertoncordeiro, CC BY-SA 3.0. The technical specifications are real even if the dam is not built. The structure would stretch 1,287 meters across the Tapajós at a maximum height of 35.3 meters, holding back water 66 meters deep on the upstream side and releasing it at 50 meters below. The hydraulic head is on...

Image: Wevertoncordeiro | CC BY-SA 3.0

Jatobá Hydroelectric Power Plant: A Law, a Lawsuit, a Pause

Thu, 16 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Wevertoncordeiro, CC BY-SA 3.0. To make space for the plant, Provisional Measure 558 of January 2012 redrew the boundaries of several Amazon protected areas. It removed 19,915 hectares from the Tapajós Environmental Protection Area and trimmed the Amazônia National Park and the Itaituba I, Itaituba II, and Crep...

Image: Wevertoncordeiro | CC BY-SA 3.0

Jatobá Hydroelectric Power Plant: A River Under a Question Mark

Thu, 16 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Wevertoncordeiro, CC BY-SA 3.0. Flying over this stretch of the Tapajós today, you see one of the great clear-water rivers of the Amazon basin, running blue-green where it passes over sandy bottoms and broken by rapids near the proposed dam sites. The Tapajós meets the Amazon at Santarém, where the pale Tapajós...

Image: Wevertoncordeiro | CC BY-SA 3.0