Saving Iceland

Orion Magazine
March / April 2004

An important article which provides useful historical background.

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This historic action marks the beginning of Saving Iceland.

DON’T LET THE SUN GO DOWN ON ICELAND!

 

This was the message demonstrators at Tate Modern wanted to get across as Icelandic artist Olafur Eliasson’s hugely successful ‘Weather Project’ exhibition – featuring a giant sun – came to an end.

The 25 demonstrators staged an “umbrella protest” against the ALCOA dam currently under construction in the Icelandic highlands which will see vast swathes of Europe’s last remaining wilderness flooded in 2006.

Interviewed in the Guardian newspaper on the 27/12/03 Olafur Eliasson himself stated that his “greatest fear is that US aluminium giant ALCOA is destroying the Icelandic highlands with the support of our government.”

The Icelandic government recently announced further plans for similar projects which, protesters say, will spoil much of Iceland’s world-famous pristine nature.

“The government want to turn Iceland into a heavy industry hell,” said one protester, Icelandic environmentalist Olafur Pall Sigurdsson. “These mega projects benefit nobody except the multinational companies who instigate and build them. ”

“This programme of building big dams in Iceland will drag us back into the 20th century when the rest of 21st century Europe and the US is busy dismantling environmentally unfriendly dams,” Sigurdsson went on. Read More

This morning a case was filed in the Reykjavík District Court, brought by natural scientist Hjörleifur Guttormsson, resident of the district Fjarðabyggð in East Iceland, against the multinational aluminium conglomerate Alcoa and the Icelandic Ministers of the Environment and Finance, concerning the proposed aluminium smelter in Reyðarfjörður, East Iceland. Supreme Court Attorney Atli Gíslason will prosecute the case on behalf of the plaintiff.

News release – PDF file

Briefing from International Rivers Network and Friends of the Earth
January 2004

The article in pdf format

EXPOSING THE EQUATOR PRINCIPLES

 

Barclays bank are helping to arrange a $400 million loan to an Icelandic power company (‘Landsvirkjun’) to construct the countries biggest hydropower project (‘Karahnjukar’) in the Iceland Central Highlands, the second largest remaining wilderness area in Europe, in apparent breach of the banks own green project finance principles the Equator Principles and for the primary purpose of providing cheap electricity for a new aluminium smelter (‘Fjardaal’) for the aluminium producer Alcoa. Read More

‘Damned Nation’ is very good on the spiel behind the Karahnjukar project and Alcoa.

The Ecologist
v.33, n.10, 1. Jan 2004

Costing over $1 billion, the Karahnjukar hydroelectric dam in Iceland is a hugely controversial project. Mark Lynas journeyed to the blasting face, hoping to work out for himself whether this industrial elephant is green or brilliant-white.

Reassurances in the Impregilo work camp canteen Read More

‘Power Driven’ appeared in The Guardian Weekend in 2003 and made a major impact in Iceland. It is still the best main stream analysis of many key issues at stake and an excellent overview of the social background.

In Iceland, work has already begun on a colossal $1bn dam which, when it opens in 2007, will cover a highland wilderness – and all to drive one US smelter. Environmentalists are furious, but the government appears determined to push through the project, whatever the cost. Susan DeMuth investigates.

North of Vatnajokull, Europe’s biggest glacier, lies Iceland’s most fascinating and varied volcanic landscape. Ice and boiling geothermal infernos meet at the edges of the glacier, and then the largest remaining pristine wilderness in western Europe begins – a vast panorama of wild rivers, waterfalls, brooding mountains and mossy highlands thick with flowers. Read More

The $400 million loan for Iceland’s National Power Company

On July 9, 2003, a $400 million revolving credit was signed by Iceland’s National Power Company (Landsvirkjun) and a consortium of 19 banks. The mandated arrangers of the loan are Barclays Bank (UK), Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation (Japan), SEB (Sweden), and Societe Generale (France), with shares of $31 million each. The other members of the consortium are CDC IXIS (France), Danske Bank (Danmark), DePfa Group (Germany/Ireland), Dexia Group (France/Belgium), Fortis Bank (Netherlands), Islandsbanki (Iceland) and Landesbank Baden–Wuertemberg (Germany), with $25 million each; Deutsche Postbank (Germany), KBC Bank (Belgium) and Norddeutsche Landesbank Girozentrale (Germany), with $17 million each; and BNP Paribas (France), Deutsche Bank (Germany), JP Morgan (USA), Kaupthing Bunadarbanki (Iceland) and Landsbanki Islands (Iceland) with $10 million each. Read More

International Rivers Network
1847 Berkeley Way, Berkeley, CA 94703, USA, irn@irn.org

An Analysis of the Karahnjukar Hydropower and Reydaral Aluminum Smelter Project in Iceland

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Einar Þorleifsson and Jóhann Óli Hilmarsson
World Birdwatch vol. 25 no. 2, June 2003

 

As reported in the previous issue of World Birdwatch (25(1):7), a huge dam is being built in a remote part of Iceland to supply hydroelectric power for an aluminium smelter. The development is vigorously opposed by Fuglaverndunarfélag Íslands (Icelandic Society for the Protection of Birds, ISPB, Birdlife in Iceland). ISPB’s Einar Ó. Thorleifsson and Jóhann Óli Hilmarsson discuss the likely impacts on the unique wildlife and scenery of this pristine environment. Read More

Mines and Communities
London Calling!
February 19 2003

THE “WOOF” AND ITS WEB-FOOTED FRIENDS

Birds have a habit of coming home to roost. None more so than the rare pink-footed geese, who winter in Britain and nest and feed at Karahnjukar in Iceland every year. Whether dodgy deals by conservationists also come home to roost is open to question.

However, the world’s biggest public-subscription conservation organisation now faces what might (just) be its biggest controversy yet. The World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF, or”WOOF” as its fondly known) seems split down the middle over a new sponsorship deal. Read More