Colombia announced that it will increase coal exports to Germany

The national government assures that the country is considering increasing coal exports to Germany in order to strengthen its energy security, and thus fill the shortages left by Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

In a telephone dialogue with the foreign minister of the European nation, Olaf Scholz, Duque proposed that Colombia export coal and took the opportunity to discuss the situation in Ukraine.

“This morning we had a very good conversation with Chancellor Sholz. A conversation where we speak, first, of the total rejection that we must continue to maintain in the international community in the face of these atrocities that have occurred in Ukraine. They are unacceptable, they are crimes against humanity,” the president told the media.

According to Duque, topics such as the “energy transition, of Germany's support in the energy transition, of how Germany is also betting with its companies in the energy transformation” of Colombia were discussed.

According to the president, it is time for Colombia to be an ally in providing energy security for different European countries, which are going through a crisis due to the current war situation in the east of that continent.

He indicated that the increase in hydrocarbon exports to Germany will be accompanied by a green initiative that will benefit the clean energy that Colombia wants to build.

“So Colombia is also going to increase its export to Germany and, of course, there is also an interest from Germany to see how it can enjoy Colombia's participation in different forms of energy for its energy security. We are a country that exports hydrocarbons, we are a country that exports coal, but we are also on the road to being a country that exports green hydrogen. And this, for Foreign Minister Sholz, is part of the strategy he wants to define with Colombia in the short, medium and long term,” said the president from Valledupar.

This Wednesday, the presentation of the Self-Generation Project was held with the Indigenous Communities of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, in which the State, private enterprise and ancestral peoples intervened, with the common objective of generating well-being for Colombians.

The President of the Republic, Iván Duque Márquez, stressed that this proposal by GreenWood Energy adds to the goal of the energy transition led by the National Government.

The project will have a total capacity of 144 megawatts divided into six plants, and will reduce 1.18 million tons of CO2 during the first 35 years of operation.

The investment is USD 120 million, in three phases, for the construction of the parks and will benefit 1.5 million people throughout the Caribbean region.

He said that this shows the world “that our country's ancestral communities are also committed to the energy transition. A transition that must be made in a fraternal alliance between companies, the State and communities”.

The head of state emphasized that GreenWood Energy, after three years of constant dialogue, of building trust, of telling communities that they should not only be promoters but partners in these projects, today officially launched the Terra initiative, which will be able to connect to the country's electricity grid, generate employment and carry it new technology “to a region blessed by a canicular sun, which is the symbol of the ancestral luminosity of our ancestral communities”.

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