María Eugenia Moreno, General Manager, Ecuambiente

Ecuambiente has been providing some of the nation’s best hazardous waste management, waste recovery and valuation, and environmental remediation and restoration.

• Interview

How has the company diversified its offerings beyond a focus on oil to an increasing number of sectors of environmental relevance?

The company is turning 30 years old and was created to provide environmental consulting services mainly to the hydrocarbons industry. Over the years it has expanded and diversified to new areas and client groups. We are now present in other strategic sectors like mining and working with some of the medium and large-scale companies active in the country. We have considerable experience in developing environmental impact studies, as well as consultancy, audits, training, hazardous waste management, and environmental remediation. In the first few years, we worked with many of the first French and American companies that came to Ecuador and collaborated in drafting some of the environmental regulations that control the hydrocarbons industry. In 2001 we carried out the Conceptualization of Environmental Hydrocarbon Liabilities report, which was used for almost a decade. We have been active in supporting the public sector for strategic environmental assessments and environmental licensing policymaking. In the oil sector, we have worked with both public and private companies, most of them located in the Amazon. In 2005, we created the first remediation center dedicated to supporting remedial efforts. The center is called CIIE (the Integral Center for Ecological Engineering for its acronym in Spanish), where we provide environmental solutions in the areas of hazardous waste management, waste recovery and valuation, environmental remediation and restoration. CIIE was the first center of that kind in Ecuador to obtain an environmental license from the Ministry of Environment, which it got in 2006.

How has the environmental compliance of companies working in Ecuador’s extractive industries evolved?

The situation in the oil industry has its own regulations and certification, whereas the mining industry has evolved in recent years. Much of the experience required by mining companies to develop their projects came from personnel trained in the oil industry and experienced foreigners, due to the lack of local expertise. Today, oil and mining companies also pay greater attention to detail regarding certification and compliance with regulations. The oil industry has been one of the most overseen industries by the regulators in Ecuador, and the activities of operators are constantly monitored. In the mining sector, the Fruta del Norte and Mirador projects started operations, which is great economic news. Nonetheless, the government has emphasized that these large-scale mining projects have to fulfill the highest environment standards established. One of the sensitive issues for mining companies in Ecuador is the lack of a good communication strategy, keeping in consideration that this is a large-scale startup industry in Ecuador. The population needs to be aware of the potential for national development, best practices and successful examples, industrial regulations, and inherent problems. While mining process are similar worldwide, when it comes to environmental issues, we need to be very sure that we know the specific conditions. For instance, in Peru and Chile, the major areas where mining takes place tend to be isolated, with less presence of water, while in Ecuador this is not the case, particularly in the south. Productive and extractive activities in Ecuador coexist with the presence of natural protected areas, which is a challenge the government and companies need to keep in mind when licensing and running environmental assessments.

“We have been active in supporting the public sector for strategic environmental assessments and environmental licensing policymaking.”

What are your short-term plans?

Our goal is, faithful to our mission, to continue contributing to the conservation of natural resources within the framework of developing our country. One of our initiatives involves working with the circular economy concept through waste recovery, for example with the recovery of oils and hydrocarbons as a source of energy and recycling of plastics. We are also working with a project known as ‘Oxígeno para el futuro’ (Oxygen for the future) with an NGO dedicated to preserving the natural landscape of Ecuador. ✖

María Eugenia Moreno GENERAL MANAGER, ECUAMBIENTE