“The important thing is to tell investors that it is the time for Colombia”said the Minister of Mines and Energy, Irene Vélez, who confirmed this Sunday that the country will have the first competitive process for offshore wind power generation projects.
“We have been organizing this since we arrived at the Government on day one and the specifications to go to auction will be ready in August. It is an area that will be subdivided, we believe that between four and six wind generation projects will be able to fit there”said the Minister.
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It also added that said area would be developed in the department of Atlántico and It would be the first “granted offshore in Colombia and in Latin America.”
Likewise, Vélez expressed the export potential to Portugal that the country haswith the generation of green hydrogen, whose pioneering projects were proposed in the National Development Plan to accelerate this purpose.
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“Having been here in Portugal and in Spain has been very important because Portugal thinks of itself as the green hydrogen producing region for Europe and also wants to be the port where imports of green hydrogen arrive to distribute in the rest of the European continent. On the other hand, we can be that place from where green hydrogen comes out for export”, specified the Minister of Mines and Energy.
Energy transition: technology and environment
Since his arrival in the Government, President Gustavo Petro has frequently spoken about the energy transition and its importance for environmental balance. In Egypt (Cop27), in New York (UN Assembly) and in his presidential possession, Petro has kept everything related to climate change in the first line of his speech. The energy transition and the progressive abandonment of extractivist practices are some of the most important issues on the Executive’s agenda for the coming year. But, what actions have been taken in this regard in the first 100 days of the self-proclaimed ‘Government of Change’?
In a recent rendering of accounts made by the Ministry of Mines and Energy Through a report, it is established what will be the beginning of the energy transition with a six-month dialogue table. The minister Irene Velez He will be the one who leads this stage and who determines the roadmap for the entire process.
Dialogues for the energy transition
The Government has indicated that such dialogues should be carried out in the departments where there is a greater concentration of mining and oil practices. The labor qualification of the employees of the mining-energy sector will be evaluated, as well as the “gender and ethnic” approach will be taken into account by which the officials delegated for the process have been guided.
It has been made clear that all actors related to the sector must participate in the dialogues: communities, employees, businessmen, local governments, unions, users and merchants.
“This transition implies structural changes in the country’s energy system for the gradual substitution of fossil energy sources, through the expansion of renewable energies; it implies the transition from an extractivist economy to a productive economy”, they point out.