H1 2026 Evaluation
Belize Reservoir Transparency
F26Opaque — Ranked #90 out of 167 countries
weight 30%
weight 20%
weight 15%
weight 13%
weight 10%
weight 8%
weight 5%
Primary source evaluated
Fortis Belize Ltd (operator: Chalillo, Mollejon, Vaca dams)
https://www.fortisbelize.com/operationsDimension breakdown
Data Availability
20% of total score
Fortis Belize operates three hydroelectric dams on the Macal River: Chalillo (124 Mm³ live storage), Mollejon (run-of-river), and Vaca (40 Mm³, 19 MW, commissioned 2010). Fortis issues reactive press statements during drought events or flood spill events with qualitative water level descriptions, but no structured public dataset, portal, or regular numerical publication exists.
Technical Accessibility
15% of total score
No machine-readable format, no API, no downloadable data. Dam level information is communicated through Fortis Belize press releases and media statements only. The Hydrology Unit of the National Meteorological Service maintains 27 hydrological observation sites, but their data is not publicly accessible online.
Coverage
30% of total score
Capacity-weighted (v1.3.0): Fortis Belize operates Chalillo (124 Mm³) and Vaca (40 Mm³) on the Macal River and publishes reactive operational notices covering both qualifying reservoirs during drought or spilling events. Coverage is purely reactive (press-release format) with no scheduled publication. Score lowered from 50 to 42 to apply a conservative discount: the disclosure is reactive only (no continuous bulletin, no historical archive) and Fortis's communications use qualitative descriptions rather than systematic numerical reporting. Prior justification (preserved for context): Methodology denominator counts reservoirs with capacity >10 hm³. Belize has 2 qualifying reservoirs: Chalillo (124 Mm³ live storage) and Vaca (40 Mm³, 19 MW, commissioned 2010), both on the Macal River. Mollejon is run-of-river and below threshold. Fortis Belize covers both qualifying reservoirs in its reactive press releases (e.g., the November 2024 spilling event mentioning all three dams; June 2024 drought-monitoring statements). Coverage = round(100 × 1 / 2) = 50, reflecting event-driven rather than systematic disclosure of the two qualifying facilities.
Historical Depth
13% of total score
No publicly archived time-series exists. Environmental monitoring for the Chalillo dam project includes water quality data from 23 stations along the Macal River, but these are ecological monitoring datasets, not reservoir storage level archives, and are not publicly downloadable.
Update Frequency
10% of total score
Fortis Belize issues dam status statements reactively — during significant drought (as in mid-2024) or major rainfall events (as in November 2024 when all three dams spilled). There is no fixed reporting schedule. In normal conditions months can pass without any public statement on reservoir levels.
Methodological Transparency
8% of total score
No documentation of measurement methodology, datum reference, or storage-to-level conversion is publicly available. Fortis Belize statements describe conditions qualitatively ('levels decreasing', 'spilling ongoing') without citing measurement standards or volumetric figures.
Language and Usability
5% of total score
All Fortis Belize communications are in English, which is Belize's official language. Press releases are clear and accessible to international readers. The operator website is in English only.
Evaluator notes
Belize is the most data-capable country in this batch, though it remains in a very low transparency tier. The three Fortis Belize dams on the Macal River — Chalillo (the main storage reservoir at 124 Mm³), Mollejon, and Vaca — are economically significant, providing roughly 40% of national electricity. Fortis Belize (owned by the Canadian utility Fortis Inc.) monitors water levels operationally and has issued media statements during the 2024 drought and the November 2024 high-flow event confirming that all three reservoirs were at spill conditions. However, this constitutes reactive disclosure, not structured transparency: no data portal exists, no time-series is published, and no API or downloadable format is available. The Hydrology Unit within the National Meteorological Service operates 27 stream-gauge stations but their data is not publicly distributed online. A meaningful improvement in Belize's RTI score would require Fortis Belize to publish regular (e.g. weekly) reservoir level and inflow data, or the government to mandate this through utility regulation. The existing environmental monitoring programme for the Macal River ecosystem provides a ready institutional basis for such disclosure if political will were present.
Evaluated by Jaime Delgado · 2026-09-15 · Methodology v1.3.0