Closing Down Coal in Chile

Chile's coal power industry contributes to climate change and has caused public health harms. Activists are fighting to close down coal.

Nicholas Triozzi

September 18, 2023

Smokestack emissions from a coal-fired power plant pictured at sunset.

Chile stands out because it has a coal plant decommissioning policy and has begun implementing it. This is a crucial step towards eliminating use of fossil fuels and absolutely necessary for keeping global warming below 1.5 degrees Celsius. Meeting this goal requires stopping fossil fuel use now.

Several factors contribute to Chile's progress on this front, including persistent public pressure, policies that facilitated construction of renewables, and a favorable geography. Concern among many in Chile with climate change, water scarcity, destruction of ecosystems, and the consequences of pollution is high, and this translates into efforts to advance progressive climate actions at local, national and global scales.

Fossil fuel decommissioning is advancing in Chile, but mining poses major challenges which still need to be addressed.

Decarbonization in Chile

Chile’s goals to become carbon neutral by 2050 will require decommissioning of fossil fuel infrastructure. The IPCC has called for carbon neutrality by 2030 for wealthy countries and 2040 for all countries. Chile has ample solar, wind and mineral resources, including lithium and copper, needed for low-carbon energy production on a global scale. But mining is detrimental to the environment. See "Decarbonizing Chile" Story Map for more information about that.

In recent years Chile announced plans to convert 70% of its total energy consumption to renewable energy by 2030 and to become carbon neutral by 2050.

In 2022 Chile's use of fossil fuels accounted for 47% of the electricity it produced. The remaining 53% was produced using hydroelectric power generation, wind, and solar energy.

Click to activate the map and hover over the pie chart for a breakdown of Chile's 2022 power sources.

To become carbon neutral by 2050, Chile must continue to dramatically reduce it's emissions.

Emissions from Chile's electricity generation in 2022 is estimated to be 27.7 metric tons of CO₂. Coal is the largest source of emissions (average 15.9 mtCO₂ per year) while solar and wind contribute on average just 0.005% of the total emissions each year.

Explore emissions by country, year, and power sources in the interactive chart to the left to see how Chile's emissions compare with other countries globally.

Closing Down Coal

Environmental activism plays a central role in Chile's transition to low-carbon energy. Prior to 2022 coal provided the majority of the country's power. Activists ran successful campaigns against new coal plants, which were not built, thus contributing to the development of new solar and wind power generation sites. Unfortunately, for many communities the damaging effects of fossil fuel and industrial pollution will take decades to overcome. A case in point is Ventanas. Read more below.

Coal is the largest fossil fuel contributor to CO2 emissions in Chile .

As of today, 9 plants have been decommissioned
Many of the operational plants are scheduled to be decommissioned by 2025, but for eight plants no decommission date has yet been announced.
Activism helped prevent the construction of new coal plants at 12 locations in Chile (labelled “cancelled”). These had all initiated environmental impact review before they were cancelled.

Explore the numbers and power capacities of active, decommissioned, and cancelled coal plants in different areas in the map. Click on a point to access more information.

Decommissioning in Action

The Ventanas Industrial Complex, located on the Pacific coast north of Valparaíso, has irreversibly transformed this once picturesque beach town into a dense hub of factories owned by international and Chilean corporations. Decades of poorly regulated material processing has resulted in severe environmental damage and major public health concerns. Activists have made some progress towards shutting down some of the operations here but the work is far from finished. Read more below.

The Ventanas Industrial Complex has expanded continuously since 1966, and today is home to twelve major petrochemical, energy and mining companies. This beach town is today one of Chile’s most heavily polluted sites. Locals suffer from recurrent acute intoxication events and some of the highest cancer rates nationwide.

Hover over colored areas to see which companies own operations in the Ventanas Industrial Complex.

Despite such high rates of pollution, since 1997 the Chilean environmental authority – through the environmental impact assessment process – approved 68 new industrial projects here. The studies submitted as part of these assessments never took into account the complex as a whole. Many studies used questionable methods to estimate pollution and its potential to cause harm. And, studies aside, Chilean laws allow higher levels of pollution than international standards (Barandiaran and Oyarzun, 2023; Chile Sustentable July 2022 report).

The harm suffered by the local population was not a surprise. Before the approval of the first smelter, nearby agricultural communities raised concerns about the impacts of emissions on their farms. In 1985, workers like Luis Eduardo Pino complained about suffering the effects of lead and arsenic poisoning.

The government of Gabriel Boric announced in June 2022 that the copper smelter would be closed: decommissioned.

One coal-fired power plant has also been decommissioned , but three more are still operating. Two (Nueva Ventanas and Campiche) announced plans to close in January 2025. One (Ventanas 2) missed its commitment to close by December 2022. The coalition “Chao Carbon” (goodbye coal) is working to ensure Chile meets this 2030 deadline.

Cleaning up Ventanas will take decades. What soil remediation techniques will be used? Will the massive and aged facilities be dismantled, and can this be done without releasing toxic dust? Will they be converted into new industrial sites, which may bring new rounds of harmful pollution? Keeping the state and the many companies operating at Ventanas accountable throughout clean-up process and rebuilding will be hard.

In the meantime, more than 100 residents of this area have given their testimony in what has been called “Chile’s biggest environmental court case ever,” in pursuit of recognition of the suffering they have lived at the hands of Chile’s largest industrial polluters. The Environmental Tribunal’s verdict is expected in 2023.