In Guaíba, in southern Brazil, the effects of CMPC’s pulp mill enter people’s homes. Residents living nearby describe a rotten-egg smell from reduced sulfur compounds that irritates the eyes and nose and causes headaches and nausea. They live with noise and powerful vibrations, in some areas around the clock. Residents report cracks in their homes and disrupted sleep while sawdust and even foam from the mill’s effluent treatment plant fall on their houses. Soot and dust cover laundry hanging on clotheslines and cars parked in driveways, making it standard practice for the company to pay for the washing of neighborhood vehicles.

And then there are the accidents.

Workers have suffered poisoning and injuries, including fatal incidents. Chlorine leaks have affected residents living nearby, while communities still do not have an adequate emergency plan for a major accident.

Now CMPC Wants to Build Another Pulp Mill

Chilean pulp and paper company and monoculture tree plantation CMPC plans to build the so-called Natureza Project in Barra do Ribeiro, Rio Grande do Sul. The project isn’t simply a factory. It encompasses the expansion of massive eucalyptus monoculture plantations, roads, port infrastructure, dredging, transmission lines, and increased transportation, with production projected at millions of metric ton of pulp annually.

Indigenous and environmental organisations therefore question why the territorial, social, water-related, and ecological impacts of this tree monoculture expansion are not fully incorporated into the project’s assessment process.

And this is all happening as the industry continues to utilize an intense corporate lobby, leading to serious legal setbacks in corporate environmental regulation at the state and national levels. In 2023, environmental zoning regulations for forestry in Rio Grande do Sul were relaxed, allowing for the expansion of plantations from 1.2 million hectares to 4 million. And in 2024, forestry was excluded from the list of potentially polluting activities that consume environmental resources in Brazil, exempting tree monocultures from any type of environmental permit.

CMPC also actively greenwashes their activities, going as far as to fund local football tournaments. We see this as a broader scheme by corporations to mitigate pushback against their operations.

The Impact Assessment Can’t Stop at the Pulp Mill

The proposed mill would discharge industrial effluent into Lake Guaíba, a crucial water body near Porto Alegre and other municipalities with a population of around 1.3 million people. Among the issues raised publicly are water quality; cumulative effects on a watershed already under pressure; and impacts related to dredging and navigation, mining, and the discharge of wastewater and industrial effluents (including those from the company’s existing factory). The volume of water consumed by the company and the pollutants discharged into Lake Guaíba would be equivalent to the water consumption and wastewater production of the entire population of the region. Possible contaminants include dioxins, extremely toxic chemical compounds that can enter the food chain and reach humans through the consumption of fish.

Lake Guaíba also supports fishing communities, contributes to drinking-water supplies, and is already........

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