In a significant legal move, the Public Defender's Office of the State of Pará (DPE-PA) and the Federal Public Defender's Office (DPU) have filed a public civil action in Federal Court. The lawsuit challenges the environmental licensing process for a major sanitary landfill project planned for the municipality of Bujaru, located in the northeastern region of the state.
The project, developed by Revita Engenharia S.A. and Guamá Tratamento de Resíduos LTDA, is designed to handle a substantial volume of waste. The facility, known as the Unidade de Valorização Sustentável (UVS) Bujaru, is projected to receive approximately 1,600 tons of solid waste daily from several cities, including Belém, Ananindeua, Marituba, Acará, and Bujaru itself. The site is situated on about 200 hectares near the PA-483 highway, close to the Guamá River.
The core of the legal challenge revolves around allegations of procedural shortcomings. The public defenders argue that the project is advancing without comprehensive studies on its social and environmental impacts. They specifically point to a lack of adequate consultation with dozens of quilombola, riverside, and traditional communities in the area. According to a report from the DPE-PA, at least 37 communities lie within a 10-kilometer radius of the proposed site, with 28 of them being quilombola settlements.
Among the communities identified are Menino Jesus, Abacatal, Jabaquara, Itacoã-Miri, Espírito Santo, Monte Alegre, Trindade, and Paraíso. The lawsuit notes that while some of these communities have formal recognition and land titles, others are still in the process of land regularization. Critically, the public defenders claim that several of these localities were not even mentioned in the environmental impact study submitted by the company.
In response to the lawsuit, the company Revita issued a statement asserting that no preliminary license has been issued yet. The company maintains that the project is following all legal procedures for licensing and that it has completed its Environmental Impact Study and Report. They also stated they had prepared a Quilombola Component Study and included it in the licensing process, and that the project site is legally established at a distance from population centers that is three times greater than the minimum required by law.
The legal petition from the DPU and DPE-PA requests several specific actions from the court. These include preventing the State of Pará from issuing the preliminary license until new studies and consultations are completed. They also seek to formally include the National Institute for Colonization and Agrarian Reform (Incra) and the Palmares Cultural Foundation in the licensing process. Furthermore, they ask for the suspension of licensing if it is proven that traditional communities were not properly heard, and ultimately, a declaration of the locational unviability of the Bujaru landfill.
This legal challenge occurs alongside another contentious waste management project in the region. The company Ciclus Amazônia is also undergoing a licensing process to install a landfill in the neighboring municipality of Acará. That project has faced significant opposition and protests from local residents who are against its construction.
Based on reporting from g1.