US actor Leonardo DiCaprio wades into Chilean power project over endangered frog
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Leonardo DiCaprio told his Instagram followers that fewer than 1,000 Pehuenche spiny-chest frogs remain in the wild.
PHOTOS: LEONARDODICAPRIO/INSTAGRAM, VICENTE VALDES
SANTIAGO - Leonardo DiCaprio urged Chilean authorities to protect a critically endangered frog from a proposed power-transmission project, injecting Hollywood star power into an environmental dispute.
The Oscar-winning actor told his almost 60 million Instagram followers on Aug 10 that fewer than 1,000 Pehuenche spiny-chest frogs remain in the wild and that the proposed Chile-Argentina transmission link threatens the amphibian’s habitat. DiCaprio, 51, said conservationists want the line’s path changed to avoid putting the species at greater risk.
The Los Condores-Rio Diamante project being developed by Enel Generacion Chile would connect the electricity systems of Chile and Argentina through a 500-kilovolt line across the Andes mountains.
In a statement on Aug 10, the company said the project, which is still in an environmental assessment stage, is intended to strengthen integration and make the countries’ power systems more secure.
Celebrity involvement has played a role in Chilean environmental battles before.
During opposition to the proposed HidroAysen hydroelectric complex in Patagonia, Puerto Rican band Calle 13’s frontman Rene Perez appeared on American television in 2011 with “Patagonia without dams” written across his back in Spanish. Chilean television personalities and musicians also backed the campaign, helping turn HidroAysen into a national political issue before authorities rejected the project in 2014.
The circumstances are different this time. DiCaprio said conservationists are not seeking to stop the project, but want its route changed to reduce the risk to the species. His intervention gives a dispute over an obscure Andean amphibian an international audience just as local authorities weigh the project’s future.
The Pehuenche frog inhabits small mountain streams and wetlands in the central Andes near the Chile-Argentina border and is classified as critically endangered. Its limited habitat has previously been damaged by road construction. DiCaprio’s intervention comes as the project remains under environmental review in Chile.
In November 2023, DiCaprio shared a video calling for First Quantum Minerals’ giant copper mine in Panama to be shut down. Later that month, Panama’s Supreme Court struck down the law underpinning the mine’s concession, prompting the government to order its closure. Bloomberg
