Environmental Alert – December 2024

Environmental Management Regulation for the Communications Sector is approved

On December 27, 2024, Supreme Decree No. 023-2024-MTC (“DS023”) was published, which approves the Environmental Management Regulation of the Communications Sector.

The main aspects regulated in the DS023 are the following:

• Activities during a State of Emergency or environmental emergency. Activities that are directly related to the mitigation, containment and minimization of impacts of the event may be carried out without the need for a prior environmental assessment. Notwithstanding, in the case of measures implemented during a State of Emergency, a PAMA must be submitted within a maximum period of 3 years from the day following the end of the emergency situation.
• Technical opinions for the approval of environmental management instruments. In addition to ANA and SERNANP, the binding technical opinion of the Ministry of Culture will be required (when there are impacts on indigenous or native peoples).
• Regulation of the Environmental Technical File – FTA). Applicable for projects that are not subject to the SEIA. In addition, the projects listed in Annex III of DS023 are not subject to the SEIA and do not require an FTA.
• Updating of environmental studies and complementary environmental management instruments-IGA. The update must be carried out no later than the fifth year after the start of the project, and for consecutive and similar periods, unless the owner determines that it is not appropriate to update the environmental study. In this case, a sworn statement must be submitted to the Competent Environmental Authority and the EFA within 60 working days prior to the expiration of the deadline for updating. In the case of the Environmental Impact Statement-EIA, the update will be made when the holder considers it pertinent or at the request of the EFA.
• Closure of activities. The decision of total closure of activities or facilities must be communicated no less than 90 calendar days prior to the start of the implementation of the closure, including the Closure Plan, which must be submitted even if the project has not had environmental certification or PAMA. The owner may communicate to the Competent Environmental Authority that there are no relevant aspects for the closure or post-closure stage, in which case the Authority will determine whether or not a partial or total Closure Plan must be submitted.
• Anticipated classification. The MTC will approve within a maximum period of 180 working days, counted as of the effective date of the DS023, the anticipated classification of environmental studies for projects with common or similar characteristics.
• Procedures in process. They are governed by the previous regulations until their completion.
• Adequacy of activities of ongoing activities. The following deadlines are established, which will be counted from the effective date of DS023:
  • 2 years to submit a PAMA to the MTC, in the case of those ongoing activities within the scope of the SEIA that do not have an approved IGA.
  • 3 years to submit a PAMA on modifications and/or expansions that have been made without prior environmental assessment, regarding a project that has an approved IGA.
  • 12 months to submit an FTA for those projects not included in the scope of the SEIA that have started operations before the entry into force of the DS023.

For further information, please contact Francisco Tong (ftong@estudiorodrigo.com), Camila Masini (cmasini@estudiorodrigo.com) y/o Rodrigo Martel (rmartel@estudiorodrigo.com).