A Critically Endangered Frog Just Stopped a Chile-Argentina Power Line
Chile's Maule environmental commission rejected Enel's Los Cóndores-Río Diamante line on 12 August over a critically endangered frog found nowhere else. The post A Critically Endangered Frog Just Stopped a Chile-Argentina Power Line appeared first on The Rio Times .
A critically endangered frog thwarted a planned Chile-Argentina power line, according to a regional commission in central Chile. The 26.7-kilometre segment of high-voltage cable, known as Los Cóndores–Río Diamante, would have traversed the Alto Maule valley where the Alsodes pehuenche lives. This microendemic species, weighing about as much as a slice of bread, inhabits cold Andean streams in the high Maule province, straddling the Chile-Argentina border.
Listed as critically endangered by the IUCN, the frog has no other population to fall back on should its habitat change. While Enel's transmission line project costs roughly US$36 million, environmental approval for the specific segment on the Chilean side was denied by the Comisión de Evaluación Ambiental of the Maule region. The decision, made on 12 August 2026, was based on unresolved concerns regarding biodiversity, protected assets, landscape, and tourism impacts.
The case received international attention following Leonardo DiCaprio's involvement, suspending an evaluation session and catapulting the issue onto the global stage. However, the broader issue of energy interconnection between Chile and Argentina remains unresolved, with the full project still pending environmental approval.
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