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The municipality of Monterrey has presented a socialization of the Odisea 3D seismic exploration project and its environmental impact to the municipal council so that council members can issue a statement regarding the project and possible bring it to a public referendum.

A chain of events set off by a truck loaded with 230 barrels of crude crashing on a Putumayo highway which led then to a spill which reached the Magdalena river, has moved local authorities to ban a number of transport companies from operating and heavy trucks from using their normal routes in Huila.

A break in UK oil producer Perenco’s pipeline caused 15 barrels of oil to leak into a nearby stream in Casanare, affecting the water supply of the Aguazul and Maní municipalities, and the local environmental management agency has called for the National Environmental Licensing Agency (ANLA) to intervene.

Oil from a rupture along the Transandino Pipeline (OTA) on the Colombia-Ecuador border has leaked into the banks of the San Miguel river causing contamination and requiring intervention from Ecuadorian NOC Petroamazonas.

In December the Tauramena municipality will hold a public referendum to approve or reject nearby oil production in certain, named villages and now in Aguazul municipal leaders are looking to do the same and get the public to vote on Ecopetrol’s (NYSE:EC) Odisea 3D seismic exploration program.

The Casanare environmental management agency Corporinoquia sat in on a meeting in Yopal to discuss problems and conflicts and problems in the department between the community and oil producers.

An article in the local paper Noticiero del Llano quoting unnamed “ecologists” is calling on Ecopetrol to assume the social responsibility of exploration and production, and called on readers to voice concerns to a mobile unit of the NOC designed to receive complaints from the community.

Two months after taking the role of the Minister of Environment and Sustainable Energy (MinAmbiente), a national paper publishes a report saying the new minister Luz Helena Sarmiento has largely remained silent since her start, a source of worry for the energy and mining industry.

The debate in Colombia on oil production has centered mainly on the seismic impact on water sources, tankers in the road, spills and labor practices, but for the first time the controversy around Hydraulic Fracturing, or Fracking, in the United States has landed in the headlines of a major business newspaper.

Equion invited local journalists to conference on the effects of seismic exploration in Yopal led by one of its geologists that sought to dispel rumors that the tests are affecting the local water supply. A public referendum has been scheduled in the nearby Tauramena municipality which addresses this issue and asks residents to approve or reject nearby oil production in general.