Water access issues In a meeting at Bani City Hall in October 2014, the National Committee to Fight Climate Change criticised the government’s negligent approach to the province’s demands. They said the population lacks drinking water and irrigation, despite increased dam levels, and, instead of rationalizing it, diverts it all to the city of Santo Domingo.

Representatives complained that without irrigation they cannot plant onions. They also complained that under the pretext of solving power blackouts, the pollution from the coal-fired plants will pose a threat to people’s health, the environment, farming and livestock in the province.

Corruption The bidding process by which the Brazilian Odebrecht company was chosen to construct the plant was highly questionable and has been widely criticised. It is alleged that the project is overvalued by between USD 500 million and USD 1 billion, and that the money obtained in this way has been used to finance the re-election campaign of the president of the Republic, Danilo Medina. The Dominican justice system has been facing a crisis of credibility, with protests demanding the resignation of all the island state's high court judges. This major infrastructure project stands out as an emblematic case of high level corruption that continues to go unpunished.

A January 2016 article in the Dominican Today newspaper also covered these corruption allegations: "Prominent attorney Namphi Rodriguez warned Tuesday that the so-called 'hidden contract' to build two coal-fired power plants violates the Constitution and the Public Procurement Law, because it was an attempt to turn a power of attorney from president Danilo Medina into an authorization, ignoring the principles of transparency, objectivity, equality and publicity."

In late December 2016 the extent of Odebrecht's bribery activities were confirmed in a US court action where, as part of a plea bargain, the company admitted to paying officials to help secure lucrative construction contracts in 12 countries, including in Dominican Republic. An investigation into Odebrecht corruption in Dominican Republic was swiftly set up to consider the $92 million in bribes which it admitted to having paid out to intermediaries and Dominican officials in the period between 2001 to 2014. 

With the confirmation of these long-suspected scandals, Dominican environmental group National Committee against Climate Change has called on the island state's purchasing and procurement agency to cancel the contract for the Punta Catalina coal-fired power plant with Odebrecht, and permanently disqualify it as a State contractor. The Committee's appeal to the General Directorate of Public Contracts is based on Dominican Republic's Law 340-06 which holds that if procurement-related bribes are confirmed then bidding processes must be canceled and any executed contracts are to be terminated. The same law also requires the disqualification of companies which have performed bribes, which have committed this offence in other cases or which have executives with convictions for corruption.

In June 2017, the office of the Attorney General of the Dominican Republic released a statement asserting that no bribery had taken place during the Punta Catalina tender process, but rather bribery had played a role in the securing of the legislative approval for the project’s financing: that is, Odebrecht paid bribes to two legislators in the National Congress in order to ensure the approval of financing for Punta Catalina. The USD 1.2 billion financing in question was to come from the Brazilian Development Bank and the consortium of European banks. Testimony from Marco Vasconcelos Cruz, the former CEO of Odebrecht in the Dominican Republic, has also acknowledged that a Dominican senator and a deputy were paid bribes to ensure the approval of the financing for Punta Catalina.

The Punta Catalina and the adjacent Santa Catalina power plants are expected to produce 174,000 tons of ash and 14,000 tons of slag per year as waste from burning coal, as well as 30 tons of nitrogen dioxide and 30 tons of sulphur dioxide every day that will be pumped into the atmosphere, and numerous heavy metal micro-particles. On top of this, the Punta Catalina coal plant is expected to emit 5-8 million tons of CO2 every year.

According to Sourcewatch, in December 2015 local organisations and individuals filed for an injunction in the Superior Administrative Court to halt the construction of both Punta Catalina Power Central and Santa Catalina Power Central. They said that the plants violate Environment and Natural Resources Law 64-00 which stipulates that any project that affects adjacent areas must first have an environmental license.

The project threatens to violate the basic human right to health and a healthy environment, in particular for people living in the area close to the project. The issue is all the more problematic because of the lack of clear information and assessment of the potential hazards that a coal plant project involves.