The Office of the Comptroller General of the Republic (CGR) identified 20 projects in Guanacaste in which the National Environmental Technical Secretariat (Setena) irregularly granted environmental clearances.
The failures occurred both in the approval process and in the follow-up that Setena must provide once construction begins.
The report revealed at least 22 findings across the projects in the province (two had more than one irregularity): 16 had reports with no date of preparation, one included information containing data from another project, in three cases the construction logbook was not included in the public files, and in another the developer failed to report the start of construction.
The projects flagged are located in the districts of Tamarindo, Veintisiete de Abril and Cuajiniquil in Santa Cruz; Nosara and Mansión in Nicoya; Nacascolo in Liberia; Sardinal in Carrillo; and Colorado in Abangares.
These deficiencies leave room for possible acts of corruption in the processes, according to Lía Barrantes, Manager of the CGR’s Sustainable Development Oversight Area.
“That is what Setena is for: a series of controls and criteria that allow them to verify the quality, accuracy, and traceability of the information being generated, which is the basis for decision-making. If this does not happen, decisions are being made that are not objective, based on information that may be incomplete and possibly untrue. And if that happens, the risk of corruption increases and ecosystems are put at risk,” Barrantes commented.
For environmental law specialist Sofía Barquero Barquero, it is “extremely serious” that 16 case files in the province contain reports with no date of preparation.
“They could be reusing studies carried out years ago when the ecosystem conditions in the area were different (…) I have seen case files at Setena with reports done ten years ago. One of the effects could be failing to expose or evaluate the current conditions of ecosystems at the time environmental clearances are approved,” she said.
In addition, the CGR report found that two environmental clearances were approved by the institution even though the information submitted by developers did not correspond to the project to be developed. One of these corresponds to file D1-0234-2024 located in the district of Nacascolo, Liberia.
These results correspond only to the random sample taken by the CGR and do not represent the total number of projects with environmental clearance in the province.
In April 2025, for example, La Voz revealed that Epic Nosara, a luxury real estate development in Nosara, was practically completed without Setena being aware that construction had begun, which prevented verification of whether what was built matched what had been approved in the environmental clearance. The CGR identified this same irregularity in six projects nationwide, one of them located in Nacascolo, Liberia.
Setena operating blindly
The CGR analyzed a total of 59 files from various projects located along the coasts of Guanacaste, Limón, and Puntarenas due to the natural wealth present in these areas and the economic interests behind real estate development in these regions, according to Barrantes.
Coastal areas carry greater risk. There are many significant developments in places where there may be forests or important fragile ecosystems,” Barrantes said.
Nationwide, the most recurrent irregularity is the lack of inspections by Setena at the time environmental clearances are approved.
An investigation by La Voz de Guanacaste revealed that the Epic Nosara development failed to comply with a key requirement: notifying the institution prior to the start of construction so that SETENA could verify that what was being built matched what had been approved.
For Barquero, inspections could prevent other irregularities that arise due to Setena’s lack of follow-up on the projects it approves.
Inspection is a moment that can contain other serious shortcomings that could be reduced if this filter existed (…) Submitting undated reports and reports belonging to other projects could be avoided if Setena conducted on-site inspections,” the lawyer explained.
Barquero believes that, due to the lack of inspections, Setena “is blind when it approves (the environmental clearance) and blind after it is approved. The entire process becomes a mechanism to legitimize environmental damage.”
“If this happens even with an institution like Setena, imagine the lack of control if Setena did not exist at all. What is needed is for the institution to improve. Not to become enemies of Setena, but to demand that it improves, that it be given a budget, that there be more controls. Setena remains very important and must be strengthened,” Barquero emphasized.
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