Colombia’s wind farms convey promise and ache for indigenous group

When José Luis Iguarán steps outdoors his residence in La Guajira, northern Colombia, he’s met with a line of 10 towering wind generators stretching throughout the cactus-strewn terrain towards the Caribbean Sea.

The Wayuu indigenous group, which Mr Iguarán belongs to, has lived on the arid peninsula area for hundreds of years, herding goats, tending to crops, mining salt, and fishing.

With a few of Colombia’s strongest winds, La Guajira has now turn into the epicentre of the nation’s shift from fossil fuels to renewable power.

However this inexperienced ambition has confronted each resistance and reflection from locals, whose territory is deeply tied to tradition, custom, and a profound connection to nature.

“You get up and all of a sudden you now not see the bushes. As an alternative, you see and listen to the generators,” Mr Iguarán says.

His neighborhood now shares its land with Guajira 1 – one in all Colombia’s two operational wind farms. One other 15 wind farms are at the moment below development in La Guajira, and there are plans for dozens extra.

“At evening, the noise from the generators disturbs our goals. For us, goals are sacred,” Mr Iguarán provides.

The Wayuu, who quantity round 380,000 in Colombia and lengthen into Venezuela, have distinct traditions and beliefs. Goals are a bridge to the religious world, the place they obtain messages from their ancestors which might be interpreted throughout the household.

Regardless of the cultural disruptions, Mr Iguarán says that his neighborhood has benefited from Guajira 1. The power firm behind it, Colombian agency Isagen, has paid for them to have entry to wash ingesting water, higher roads, and durable brick homes, which have changed among the mud and cactus ones.

Isagen, which is owned by Canada’s Brookfield, additionally pays three native communities an annual price for the wind farm to be there, a proportion of annual electrical energy revenues, and 20% from the sale of carbon credit. These are purchased by firms wishing to offset their carbon emissions.

Mr Iguarán believes such power tasks may also help convey very important growth to Colombia’s second-poorest area. However not everybody shares his enthusiasm.

“The wind farms produce clear power, however they create division throughout the Wayuu communities,” explains Aaron Laguna, a Wayuu fisherman, who lives within the coastal village of Cabo de la Vela.

His neighborhood is at the moment within the technique of consultations over a wind farm as a result of be constructed close by. He has seen others affected by tasks complain a few lack of transparency, poor compensation, a disrespect of cultural norms, and corruption.

“Dangerous negotiations are made, and the assets given [to us] aren’t properly managed by locals,” he provides.

These issues have led to disputes with the power firms, and even battle inside Wayuu communities. Some oppose the tasks, whereas others really feel excluded from negotiations that would convey them advantages.

“There may be nonetheless this concept that whether it is inexperienced, it’s mechanically good,” says Joanna Barney, director of setting, power and communities at Colombian suppose tank Indepaz. It has extensively researched the power transition and its results on the Wayuu.

“In Colombia… there is not a stable authorized framework to correctly assess the environmental impacts – and the social impacts are immeasurable.”

In December 2024, Spanish firm EDP Renováveis shelved plans for 2 wind farms in La Guajira, saying the tasks have been now not economically viable.

One issue was the doubling of native indigenous communities who mentioned they might be affected, and subsequently want compensation, from 56 to 113.

EDP’s choice adopted the Could 2023 exit of Italian multinational Enel from one other deliberate wind farm within the area. Enel attributed its departure to “fixed protests” that halted development for greater than half of the working days between 2021 and 2023.

Guajira 1 was additionally marred by roadblocks, a standard means of protesting in La Guajira when locals really feel unheard.

And suppose tank Indepaz has recorded circumstances of assaults in opposition to staff of the power companies, together with armed robberies and kidnappings. And in some areas it has discovered circumstances of displacement and violence between native communities who disagree over neighbouring wind farms.

“We name it the ‘wind wars’,” says Ms Barney.

For Colombian anthropologist Wieldler Guerra, there’s a clear disconnect between the Wayuu and the wind farm firms.

“There are two worlds speaking, and so they haven’t managed to know one another,” he says.

This hole extends to the very means they understand the wind – the ingredient central to those tasks.

“For the Wayuu, the winds are individuals. It isn’t the wind, however the winds. There are eight totally different winds in Wayuu tradition, mythological and ancestral beings with distinct temperaments that form the encompassing setting and have to be revered.”

In contrast, firms and the Colombian authorities see wind as a useful resource to harness for environmental progress, revenue, and to handle the nation’s power wants.

Whereas Colombia has a comparatively clear home electrical energy matrix, with practically two-thirds coming from hydroelectricity, the nation stays weak to low reservoir ranges, which creates a threat of power shortages. Wind power at the moment contributes simply 0.1% of the power combine.

For power firms investing within the area, the chance of conflicts with native persons are a worrying prospect.

One such agency, AES Colombia is creating the nation’s largest wind power cluster in La Guajira, with six wind farms.

The corporate insists it maintains an open dialogue with communities, providing honest compensation, and making certain advantages comparable to clear ingesting water and shares in carbon credit.

Nevertheless it says good neighborhood relations aren’t sufficient.

“We can’t do these tasks alone,” says Federico Echavarría, basic supervisor of AES Colombia. “The federal government should assist resolve conflicts between communities.”

On the windswept seaside in Cabo de la Vela, Mr Laguna says La Guajira has traditionally been uncared for by the state.

Training and healthcare are poor, and most rural communities would not have working water.

Some individuals nonetheless stroll hours every day to gather water from jagüeys – reservoirs stuffed with rainwater.

His neighborhood has a small salt-water remedy plant that produces recent water and it desires the corporate planning to construct the close by wind farm to develop it, in order that extra locals profit.

Regardless of the speak of progress, he factors to a lingering paradox. “The worst factor is we cannot obtain even a single kilowatt of the electrical energy produced right here,” he laments.

The plan is for the wind farm’s electrical energy to as an alternative be despatched elsewhere, and that the village will proceed to depend on turbines, not less than within the medium time period.

Whereas the long run would possibly look brilliant for clear power, many Wayuu are nonetheless anxious they are going to be left at midnight.