Environmental and Ecotoxicological Impact of Alternative Energies: An Improvement Opportunity for Latin America

Abstract

Countering the ecological and biological impact of more than a century of use of fossil fuels has allowed the emerging and development of alternative sources of energy, this dealing with greenhouse gas emission reduction, such as CO2 or CH4. The present work arose with the purpose of spotlight and identifies the main environmental, ecological, and toxicological impacts derived during the development and implementation of methods for production of alternative energies. To unfold this investigation, a screening of available scientific information was carried out on public databases such as Scopus, Science Direct, and PubMed, with the key words for query: alternative energy, environmental, and ecotoxicological impact. As a result of this scrutiny process, it was possible to identify differential impacts associated with the production manners of alternative or sustainable energy: wave power energy would potentially contribute to the coastal erosion affecting the biodiversity of benthic or plankton; wind power energy issues are related to the negative impact on biodiversity of birds and bats as well as human populations; and photovoltaic energy negatively impacts on edaphic fauna and vegetation cover, as well as indirect ecotoxicological effects associated with the disposal of heavy metal residues. Knowing and unveiling the environmental and ecotoxicological non-positive effects associated with the implementation of alternative energy production projects is essential to prevent these impacts in future projects of the same nature, especially in Latin America, which is the continent where there are areas of high vulnerability for biodiversity, affecting the impact on ecosystems at a regional and global level.