In the Amazonian city of Altamira, a large group of indigenous leaders gathered this week, in order to join forces in a protest against plans to build a hydroelectric dam on a tributary of the Amazon.

In order to build the immense Belo Monte dam on the Xingu river, large areas of rainforest are due to be flooded, bringing an end to many local inhabitants' ways of life. Thousands of homes will be destroyed and changes in the ecology will wipe out main food sources and raw materials.

The Brazilian government are pushing the plans as a sustainable energy solution but critics have protested against the social and environmental costs.

10,000 tribal Indians live on the banks of the Xingu, and little has changed for them since the arrival of the Europeans five hundred years ago. If the project goes ahead, the local inhabitants will suffer a devastating blow.

"This is the second time we are fighting this battle," says Chief Bocaire, a young leader of the Kayapo, one of more than 600 Indians from 35 ethnic groups who gathered in record numbers in Altamira. He continued, "In 1989, our parents defeated a similar proposal with the help of the international media. Now it is back. But we are ready to fight again. This time we speak their language, and we are more determined than ever."

If built, the reservoir will flood up to 6,140 square kilometres (2,371 square miles), and scientists say it will cause a dramatic increase in greenhouse-gas emissions from the decomposition of organic matter in the stagnant water.

Philip Fearnside, one of the world's leading rainforest scientists explains that, "Hydroelectric dams have severe social impacts, including flooding the lands of indigenous peoples, displacing non-indigenous residents and destroying fisheries." He added that the project would also increase the health risks to local populations, including malaria.

And even if the dam is built, for three months in the dry season the flow of the Xingu River reduces to a trickle, rendering the dam's turbines useless. The power supply will be unable to be maintained so necessitating the use of inefficient fossil-fuel power stations.

The government of President Luis Inacio Lula da Silva has resisted protests and petitions and is promising to go ahead with the £5billion scheme, no matter what the social and ecological cost. According to Dr. Fearnside, the project will help aluminium plants looking to cash in on exports, yet will do little else for local needs.

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