Reseña

This research arises from the need to understand and anticipate the cumulative impacts and risks associated with the expansion of copper and lithium mining, as well as the installation of a hydrogen industry in the Antofagasta region of northern Chile. Both processes stem from Chile's declared intention to maintain leadership in these minerals while also becoming a world-class exporter of hydrogen and its derivatives, such as ammonia, within the framework of global, and particularly European, decarbonisation goals. Based on Tantí Foundation’s experience in the protection of Andean ecosystems—especially wetlands—, this study set out to understand the forces driving the establishment of these industries, and the emerging impacts that massive Non-Conventional Renewable Energy (NCRE)-related infrastructure developments have on territories and ecosystems already damaged by mega-mining. Following the approach of political ecology and ecological economics, we identified the environmental effects and ecologically unequal exchange resulting from green extractivism in northern Chile.