In 2003, the utility Empresas Públicas de Medellín completed a 19.5-megawatt wind farm in the coastal desert of Colombia’s La Guajira department to capitalize on one of South America’s windiest sites and ring in a new age of renewable energy. The US$28 million Jepírachi wind project seemed to offer Colombia important benefits. It would reduce the nation’s carbon emissions by 75,000 metric tons annually, replacing energy generated by coal and gas. And by selling those reductions as carbon credits for millions of dollars to international companies and foreign governments, the utility owning the project would pioneer a new system of renewable-energy financing in Colombia. Sadly for clean-power advocates, the experiment hasn’t gone according to plan. The 60-meter-high windmills of... [Log in to read more]