Among the many vaunted projects of former Mexican President Carlos Salinas de Gortari’s administration was the sprawling President Plutarco Elías Calles power plant at Petacalco Bay, Guerrero state. Opened in 1994, the facility has dramatically changed the landscape and lives of the estimated 5,000 residents of Petacalco, a fishing and farming village near the border of Michoacán state. To realize their ambitious goal of generating power for 11 million people in Guerrero and five other states in western and central Mexico, engineers and construction workers toiling under the direction of the Federal Electricity Commission (CFE) cleared land, drained swamps and dug a canal to cool the plant with water from the Balsas River. The CFE announced at the outset it would install special pollution-control... [Log in to read more]
