View of a truck loaded with coal in the Cerrejon mine.
Image: dpa
Germany is urgently looking for energy sources. The view falls on the largest opencast mine in Latin America. For some it is a blessing, for others a curse.
Dhe Wayuu don’t say hello to each other. The indigenous people living in the dry savannah on the Guajira Peninsula between northern Colombia and Venezuela did not know the term until the arrival of the Spanish. Instead, the Wayuu ask each other about their dreams at dawn. Their dreams, they say, tell them what the day will bring. For several decades, the Wayuu have not dreamed so well. Your country has changed, especially since rich coal deposits were discovered in the region.
Not far from the traditional mud and wood huts of some Wayuu settlements, the hot air shimmers over the black soil. Deep in the crater thunders the sounds of the massive machines that look like toys from afar. Excavators dig into the dark rock while water cannons spray the slopes. Huge shovels lift the brittle material onto the back of the trucks, which haul it down a maze of roads to the base. Every day, several kilometers of freight trains leave the loading station and bring the coal via the company’s own railway line to the Caribbean port of Puerto Bolívar, 150 kilometers away. The cargo ships that ship the raw material all over the world are waiting there.
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