MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

De la Espriella announces the reopening of oil exploration in Colombia, including fracking

Colombian President Abelardo de la Espriella announced on Friday that his government will “fully” reopen hydrocarbon exploration and the signing of new contracts, including hydraulic fracturing, during the swearing-in of businessman Joaquín Gutiérrez as president of Ecopetrol, the country's largest company.

“My government is fully reopening the path of exploration and the signing of new contracts, including fracking, whatever it takes, as I said during the campaign, with absolutely every criterion of environmental responsibility,” the president said, adding a call to “drop the environmental hysteria”. He criticised the policy of his predecessor, Gustavo Petro, who reduced the signing of new exploration contracts as part of an energy transition strategy: “That is not energy transition but energy dependence, which is what no policy of this government will accept. In the era of the Tiger we will have energy sovereignty.” He also backed environment ministry measures to speed up licensing procedures.

The announcement does not in itself change the existing framework. Reactivating fracking in Colombia would require reversing the cancellation of the pilot projects ordered under the previous government and navigating regulatory and judicial restrictions whose precise status the executive has not detailed. The technique faces objections over its impact on water resources and the risk of induced seismicity. No environmental or opposition voices took part in the event.

The ceremony was held at the Quinta de San Pedro Alejandrino in Santa Marta, the estate where Simón Bolívar died. Gutiérrez said his arrival opens “a new era” and that the company should “be reborn to fulfil its true mission”, with the aim of aspiring to “the places of glory among the world's leading oil companies”.

The new president also announced that Ecopetrol will have a second headquarters in Barranquilla, set out plans for a “more austere and efficient” company with higher productivity, less centralised and with a greater regional presence, and said it would be “a depoliticised Ecopetrol”. He said the company would carry out “responsible fracking”, that it would reach its highest ever value under his tenure and that his legacy would be to leave it “with reserves for decades”. He also said there would be complaints over the previous administration's management; no irregularity has been established to date.

Gutiérrez is a business administrator, takes up the post with no previous experience in the hydrocarbons sector and managed De la Espriella's presidential campaign. His appointment was announced on Thursday by Ecopetrol's board, whose members had been renewed by shareholders on September 15. The company is listed on the Colombian Stock Exchange and in New York, with the Colombian state as majority shareholder.

De la Espriella took office on August 7. In these weeks his government has aligned its foreign policy with the United States and Israel, saw Colombia kept on Washington's list of countries it deems to have failed demonstrably to combat drug trafficking — with explicit praise for the new president — and delegated the country's address to the UN General Assembly to his vice president.