TIWANAKU, Bolivia (Reuters) – Eager to attract more tourists, the town of Tiwanaku in the Bolivian Andes has spruced-up the ancient Akapana pyramid with adobe instead of stone, in what some experts are calling a renovation fiasco.

Now, the Akapana pyramid risks losing its designation as a U.N. World Heritage Site, and there is concern the makeover could even cause its collapse.

The pyramid is one of the biggest pre-Columbian constructions in South America and a building of great spiritual significance for the Tiwanaku civilization, which spread throughout southwestern Bolivia and parts of neighboring Peru, Argentina and Chile from around 1500 BC to AD 1200.

Jose Luis Paz, who was appointed in June to assess damage at the site, says the state National Archeology Union, UNAR, erred in choosing to rebuild the pyramid using adobe, when it is clear to the naked eye that the original was built of stone.

“They decided to go free-hand with the (new) design … There are no studies showing that the walls really looked like this,” Paz told Reuters as he stood before the pyramid in the Tiwanaku archeological site, some 40 miles north of Bolivia’s administrative capital of La Paz.

According to Paz, who now heads excavation at the site, the town of Tiwanaku hired the UNAR to renovate Akapana to make it “more attractive for tourists,” regardless of how the pyramid may have originally looked like.

Thousands of tourists visit Tiwanaku every year and pay about $10 to enter the site, but the village of Tiwanaku, which manages the park, thought a better-looking pyramid would attract even more visitors, he said.

LA PAZ, Oct 16 (Reuters) – Bolivia’s leftist government aims to secure a controlling stake in three power generation companies before the end of the month, a senior energy official was quoted as saying on Friday.

President Evo Morales, a close ally of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, nationalized the Andean nation’s key natural gas industry soon after taking office in 2006 and has since seized control of several utility and commodities-related companies.

A handful of foreign firms have launched legal actions over the compensation they were offered for the takeover of their assets by Morales, who is striving to step up state control of the economy.

Deputy Electricity Minister Miguel Yague told state news agency ABI the government aimed to secure a 60 to 70 percent stake in three power generation companies, two of which are controlled by foreign investors.

“I think we’re going to wrap up the negotiations before the end of the month. What we’re doing is complying with the National Development Plan, which says we have to retake control of the companies that were once owned by the state,” he was quoted as saying by the news agency.

The country’s biggest power generators are Corani, Guaracachi and Valle Hermoso. They emerged in the 1990s following the privatization of the state National Electricity Company (ENDE) and account for about half of Bolivia’s electricity market.

Corani is 50-percent owned by Inversiones Econergy Bolivia S.A., a subsidiary of France’s GDF Suez <GDFZY.PK> <GSZ.PA>. Guaracachi is 50-percent owned by Britain’s Rurelec PLC <RUR.L>, while Valle Hermoso is run by a Bolivian consortium called the Bolivian Generating Group.

GALAPAGOS, Ecuador (Reuters) – Climate change could endanger the unique wildlife of the Galapagos Islands, and scientists are trying to figure out how to protect vulnerable species such as blue-footed boobies and Galapagos Penguins.

Some 175 years after the wildlife of the Galapagos helped inspire Charles Darwin to develop his theory of evolution, scientists are measuring the impact of global warming on the rich but fragile biodiversity of the islands.

The volcanic archipelago, about 600 miles west of the Ecuadorean coast, is home to scores of endemic species that closely depend on one another for survival.

Scientists say abrupt and frequent changes in sea temperatures and the death of coral reefs near the islands show that global warming is taking its toll on local sea life.

“The coral reefs create a habitat; they are like a forest, like the Amazon. They are home to scores of species. … If the corals die we lose thousands of species that are associated to the coral,” said German marine biologist Judith Denkinger.

The Galapagos-based scientist said the harm that pollution and climate change are causing marine life could trigger a domino effect and hurt on-shore species as well.

“Everything is intertwined. You can’t say this is land, this is sea, they are both one,” Denkinger said, sitting on a rock by the sea and surrounded by growling sea lions.