At the center of the world, engineers are quietly rewiring how a nation powers itself without silencing the birds that cross its skies twice a year

Most people have seen it without really seeing it. A bird on a wire, still against the sky. It looks completely unremarkable.

But from above, the view changes entirely.

Picture a shorebird navigating a twice-yearly passage across Ecuador’s Pacific coast.

CAF’s $40 billion, five-year commitment to sustainable growth provides a financial framework for scaling this approach across Latin America and the Caribbean.

From that height, that single wire is part of something massive. It is part of 43 miles of new high-voltage infrastructure.

This heavy equipment threads right through one of the most ecologically active corridors in the Americas.

Latin America’s electricity demand could nearly double by 2050.

As grids expand to meet this hunger, millions of birds face a changing landscape. It is quietly filling with structures that intersect their flight paths, foraging grounds, and nesting sites.

Often, this happens before anyone asks whether it has to be that way.

A continent wiring itself up—at a cost to wildlife

Latin America has changed at a breathtaking pace. It is easy to underestimate the speed of this growth.

In the 1950s, around 160 million people lived across the region. Today, that number exceeds 660 million. More than 80% of these residents live in cities.

The International Energy Agency projects massive growth ahead. Regional electricity demand could grow by nearly 90% by 2050 under current policies.

It could surge by as much as 180% if climate pledges are fulfilled.

Meeting that demand means building serious infrastructure. More infrastructure means more transmission lines crossing living ecosystems.

For birds, that reality matters enormously. In the United States alone, collisions with power lines kill between eight million and 57 million birds each year.

Electrocution could account for up to 64 million more deaths.

These exact figures cannot be directly applied to Latin America. However, they signal the massive scale of what is at stake as the region’s grids expand.

Why power lines are especially dangerous for birds

The two main risks are electrocution and collision.

Electrocution happens when a bird contacts energized components. Collision occurs when wires cross a flight path.

These wires are often completely invisible, particularly at night or in poor weather.

Wet plumage increases electrical conductivity. This raises electrocution risks significantly on rainy days. Species that move after dark face heightened collision danger when infrastructure simply cannot be seen.

That high variability rules out one-size-fits-all solutions.

Effective prevention must respond to the local context. Engineers must consider the specific species, terrain, and conditions of each site.

There is also a reliability argument worth noting. The IUCN reports that bird-related incidents account for 10% to 23.5% of power outages in some electrical systems.

Designing for birds is not just a conservation choice. It is a smart grid management decision.

The Chongón–Posorja line: Where energy meets ecology

Ecuador’s Chongón–Posorja transmission line runs 43 miles along the country’s southwestern coast. It is part of a major $200 million investment led by CAF and CELEC, Ecuador’s public electricity corporation.

The project aims to connect clean hydropower generation with coastal shrimp farming complexes. This will heavily reduce dependence on fossil fuels.

The route passes near a national recreation area and two Key Biodiversity Areas. These are the Cordillera Chongón-Colonche and the Gulf of Guayaquil. Technical analysis identified 382 bird species in the area.

This includes 56 migratory species and 30 America’s Flyways Initiative focal species. It also includes 63 species with medium-to-high collision risks.

Among them are the great green macaw and the grey-cheeked parakeet. Long-distance migratory shorebirds cross this territory twice a year, every single year.

Turning science into safeguards: How the Americas Flyways Initiative intervened

The Americas Flyways Initiative led the charge to protect them. This group includes Audubon, BirdLife International, and CAF.

They applied advanced geospatial analysis and biodiversity data. This helped identify bird risk hotspots along the route right from the design stage. They worked closely alongside Aves y Conservación, BirdLife’s partner in Ecuador.

Their approach followed a strict mitigation hierarchy. Avoid sensitive areas first, then reduce impacts, then monitor.

Concrete measures include high-visibility flight diverters installed along the line. They also set up systematic collision monitoring and adaptive management informed by ongoing scientific evidence.

The process drew heavily on AFI’s Bird-Friendly Infrastructure Guide. This helped translate general principles into site-specific action.

Tools like BirdLife’s AVISTEP help planners identify sensitive areas before a route is finalized.

This is a far cheaper intervention than trying to fix a mistake after construction is complete.

From pilot project to scalable model

Chongón–Posorja is already generating intense interest. Planners want to replicate its approach on new transmission lines across Ecuador.

In a region where data on power line interactions with birds remain scarce, every well-documented project adds to a shared knowledge base.

The lessons from this line will inform decisions hundreds of miles away. We are learning what worked, what needed adjustment, and how birds actually moved through the landscape.

CAF’s $40 billion, five-year commitment to sustainable growth provides a financial framework for scaling this approach across Latin America and the Caribbean.

What Chongón–Posorja demonstrates most clearly is that the choice between energy access and ecological protection is entirely false.

Grids will expand because they have to.

The real question is whether that expansion gets designed with the landscape in mind from the start or retrofitted with regret after the damage is done.

Ecuador’s Pacific coast suggests a better path forward. What role do birds play in the work that engineers are doing?