A new 1,443-kilometre pipeline from Uganda to Tanzania: Africa defends its right to pollute

2022-11-09T04:57:16.107Z

The EACOP project, going against the climate struggle, is led by the French oil company Total and crosses 12 forest reserves. Criticized by conservation groups, the countries involved claim it to take advantage of its resources

Hilary Aligumisiriza carefully and patiently tracks the more than 60 chimpanzees that live in the lush Itohya forest in western Uganda.

1,443 kilometers away, Humphrey Mahudi unmoors the boat to monitor the health of the barrier reef and mangroves in the vicinity of the Tanga Marine Park, off the coast of Tanzania.

Both conservationists now share a major challenge.

The East African Crude Oil Pipeline, known as EACOP for its acronym in English, a project under construction to transport 216,000 barrels of crude oil every day from western Uganda to the outlet to the Indian Ocean in Tanzania, passing through 12 forest reserves, bordering Lake Victoria, the largest in Africa, and affecting up to 2,000 kilometers of protected habitats.

Uganda first discovered oil in 2006 on the shores of Lake Albert.

To the south of this African country, the oil company National Marine Petroleum Corporation of China (CNOOC) controls the Kingfisher wells that store 17% of the crude oil and, to the north, the French company Total Energies leads the extractions in Tilenga, within the Area of Murchison Falls Conservancy where the remaining 83% are located.

A decade later, the oil companies agreed with the governments of Uganda and Tanzania to build the longest heated pipeline in the world to find an outlet to the sea (so named because it would transport a viscous crude oil that must be heated to at least 50ºC to be able to flow through the pipeline). ).

The project is led by the French oil company Total Energies, with 62% of the shares.

Although the completion of the new infrastructure was scheduled for 2022, the difficulties in finding financing and the covid-19 pandemic put a stop to everything.

Today, not a kilometer of the pipeline has been built, but road and well works have already begun in western Uganda and EACOP promoters hope that it will be operational so that the first barrels can be exported from 2025.

Several workers work under the orders of an Asian foreman in the expansion of the port of Tanga to be able to serve the future oil tankers that will come to load crude oil for export, on September 14. Pablo Garrigós Cucarella (© Pablo Garrigós Cucarella)

For 11 years, Aligumisiriza has been leading the Chimpanzee Trust team in Western Uganda.

When the organization started working around the Bugoma forest reserve in 2006 there were about 600 chimpanzees, but the arrival of commercial agriculture such as sugar cane has reduced the forest and their number has dropped to 390.

“Human activities and population expansion have resulted in isolated chimpanzee communities already,” says Joshua Rukundo, a veterinarian by trade and executive director of the Chimpanzee Trust.

"There are very small patches of forest as small as 10 hectares," he adds.

The construction of the pipeline on the north face of Bugoma threatens to cut off the natural corridor with the small reserves of Wambabya and Itohya, through which female chimpanzees cross from one place to another to reproduce.

"The corridors will be affected by the project," says Rukundo, who emphasizes that the pipeline will pass between the Bugoma and Wambabya forests, an area in which the French oil company itself admits in its environmental impact study that chimpanzees live with " high sensitivity to change.

On the shores of the Indian Ocean, the pattern repeats itself.

Mahudi has been working since 2006 in the monitoring and supervision of the mangroves and the coral reef of the Tanga Coelacanth Marine Park.

The area, which extends along 100 kilometers of coastline, includes islands such as Yambe, and is home to endangered species such as sea turtles, the dugong or the coelacanth, one of the oldest fish in the world. .

“The EACOP project is a challenge for our work.

Some of the islands we work on are too close to the future oil export port in Chongoleani,” says Catherine Msina, head of the marine park.

In the vicinity of the future port, Mahudi monitors the corals and mangroves.

With a raffia thread, he delimits the trees from the sea, measures the width of their stems and observes the appearance of their leaves.

"Most of the mangroves are dying, so it is vital that we control them," she warns.

Then, carrying a bottle on his back and a 40-meter-long rope, the conservationist dives to the bottom of the Indian Ocean coast and assesses the lung of life under the sea.

“In this area is the most susceptible coral to bleaching, the

Acropora
palmata

”, he adds, while writing down the results of what he found in his notebook.

"If the temperature of the sea increases, it will easily disappear," she adds.

Three Rothschild giraffes walk through Murchison Falls National Park, where 31 drilling areas and several dozen oil wells will be built.

Murchison Falls in Uganda is the only place in the world where this species of giraffe has survived without being reintroduced by conservationists.