Currently, 57 wind farm projects are underway in the department of La Guajira, involving the installation of 2,833 wind turbines, giant windmills both on the mainland and offshore. There are also solar energy projects (see link).

Clean energy is very important as it does not produce greenhouse gases, one of the main causes of climate change. For this reason, it is crucial to advance in their implementation.

But not everything is clean in this business. This is the dirty side of clean energy projects in La Guajira.

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1. Indigenous communities left behind

These clean energy projects in La Guajira lack real prior consultation and many do not have the informed consent of the millenary inhabitants of this area, the Wuayúu.

They have been the last to know: their structure and authorities have not been respected, the processes have been advanced in a rigged manner, hiding much information, without specialized advice and generating division among the families. It is incomprehensible that since 2019 the prior consultations have become private, hidden and not accessible to stakeholders and civil society.

The Wuayúu are the ones who know the territory best and should be a fundamental part of clean energy in La Guajira, not its victims. Development is welcome, but with the native communities, not at their expense.

2. Who benefits from clean energy projects in La Guajira?

According to an important investigation by Joanna Barney, from Indepaz (see link), most projects are handed over to foreign multinationals, which have immense benefits and incentives of all kinds and will exploit our resources in exchange for crumbs. In the case of La Guajira coal, what they pay for royalties is less than 12% of all the profits they obtain, but with wind farms it will be worse! As far as is known, they would pay royalties of 6%. Total looting.

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Are we going to replicate the logic of coal and oil? Are we going to maintain the colonial and iniquitous model of fossil fuels in the era of clean energy? Will we again have to assume the immense socio-environmental costs, while these corporations take our natural wealth in exchange for mirrors?

Why are these projects not being carried out by Ecopetrol so that the benefits are collective? The public company that was in the business was Isagen, but Santos sold it despite all its energy potential.

The most paradoxical thing is that clean energy in La Guajira will not be for La Guajira. Its destination could be the National Interconnected System, but most likely the main business will be to export it as raw material at the price of eggs, so that transnationals can transform it into green hydrogen and sell it at the price of gold. The bone for Colombia, the loin for the transnationals.

As Wuayúu leader Jazmin Epiayu points out: “Petro’s tour of the countries where the companies that own the projects are located is not free” (see link).

3. Environmental impacts are not well identified

There are serious impacts on birds such as pink flamingos, and also on the bats that pollinate the vegetation of La Guajira, on which the goats feed, the basis of the Wuayúu economy and way of life. Some projects are above seagrass areas, which are great sponges for capturing carbon dioxide (CO2), and several offshore projects are in traditional fishing areas, which affects the food security of its inhabitants and tourism.

So, will Petro take into account the demands of the Wuayúu and the interests of the country, or will he side with the multinationals?

They have plundered Colombia’s gold, coal and oil from us.

Now they are coming for the wind and sun of our territory!

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