In September of 2024, the city of Linhares, Brazil granted legal rights to the waves at the mouth of the Doce River, which runs into the country’s Atlantic coast, giving the area the “intrinsic right to existence, regeneration, and restoration,” according to Hakai Magazine.
This means that the waves should continue to form naturally, and the water must be clean.
The move comes after the 2015 collapse of the Fundão dam, which resulted in gallons of waste from an iron mine being poured into the Doce River. The toxic sludge polluted the water supply for over 1 million people across 35 cities, decimated entire populations of fish, destroyed native vegetation, killed all kinds of animal species, and flattened the homes of nearly 600 people.
The sludge also built up at the mouth of the waterway, weakening its waves. Restoration only began in 2022 after a flood cleared the buildup.
Contaminated water flows through the Doce River after the 2015 dam collapse. Public domain photo (CC0 1.0)
This new law will require Linhares to protect the physical shape of the river, as well as the ecological cycles that make its waves unique.
The water’s finely balanced chemical makeup also must be protected through public policies and funding.
In addition to protecting the area in general, the Doce River is also home to an active surf and tourism scene, meaning its safety has economic ripple effects.
Hauley Silva Valim is a surfer and anthropologist who was one of the architects behind the law to protect the Regencia wave.
“The wave brings to us this kind of request for listening, to listen to the language of nature — to understand the language of nature, which is enabled by the silencing of the human mind,” Valim told Nautilus.
He added that granting rights to the wave is as spiritual as it is rooted in practical policy, stemming from a “philosophy of regeneration, a principle of liberation.”
To Nautilus, he added, “Water should run free.”
This is the first instance in which a government has given rights to part of the ocean, though Latin America has been a leader in the global movement to grant legal rights to nature.
In 2008, Ecuador was the first country to recognize the rights of nature in its national constitution, and in Colombia, the rights of rivers, a lake, and a national park have been legally recognized.
Vanessa Hasson is an environmental lawyer and executive director of the Brazilian NGO Mapas, which advocates for the country’s rights-of-nature movement.
She told Hakai Magazine that the law’s main goal is to change mindsets and shift public policies connected to water quality and resource extraction.
“When you recognize a little bit of space of the ocean, like these waves,” Hasson said, “you are reaching the whole ocean.”
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A version of this article was originally published in The 2025 Environment Edition of the Goodnewspaper.
Header image by Bruno Thethe on Unsplash
