Saving Iceland

An official inquiry has been called for by the Left-green Party into the conduct of the Icelandic authorities and police during the protests in the summer and autumn of 2005.

In the summer and autumn of 2005 the Icelandic authorities performed numerous illegal arrests, violated the rights of people in custody, entered illegally the dwellings of protestors, violated severely the peace and right of privacy of individuals with thuggish surveillance, threats and intimidating behaviour.

The Directorate of Immigration finally ruled that it had no right to deport any of the foreign people who demonstrated summer 2005 against the heavy industry policy of the Icelandic government.

The threats of deportations were in fact nothing but illegal persecution of people who were exercising their democratic rights to protest against the crimes of a highly autocratic and corrupt government. This is exactly what was pointed out in the article ‘Surprise, surprise!‘ as early as September 2005.

No actual deportations of anti-dam protestors took place. Had they taken place they would have been illegal!

People who were on the Icelandic Directorate of Immigration list for possible deportation are all perfectly free to travel back to Iceland.

The conference was organized by the Economist magazine but sponsored by Alcoa and other companies. In the publicity material for the conference, the Economist (in its guise as the ’Economist Intelligence Unit’!) promoted the conference as discussing amongst other things how Iceland can supply all of Europe’s energy needs with clean energy.

In the build up to the conference, outraged Icelanders contacted the Economist and pointed out that even if every drop of energy was squeezed from the land without any other considerations, it would still only produce 1% of Europe’s requirements. Also the energy that will be produced is actually very far from clean energy. In fact its filthy dirty.

The Economist replied that what was in the publicity material was, “marketing-speak geared to creating interest for the event.” They continued, “The journalistic approach from The Economist itself would certainly carry a different, more balanced and researched perspective.”
The unwitting honesty of this reply speaks volumes. Nuff said.

More wriggling and squirming followed about the role of the sponsoring companies, (Just supporting the conference financially, otherwise neutral.) Then they tried to suggest that the conference represented a balance of the opinions on the issues under discussion. Only problem with that being that the, ‘critical’ voice was that of a conservative opposition MP, who had actually supported the dam project wholeheartedly! Read More

Read More

Trinidad has its own Alcoa Powered Energy Master Plan:

The area around the town of Vessigny, also known as Union Village will get a Aluminum Smelter plus a handful of other gas based industries. The mega acre site is currently totally cleared of all vegetation, people in the surrounding area are asked to move and the contract for delivery of one cash and carry Chinese smelter plant has been signed. An “agreement in principle” has also been signed with Aloca for the Chatham smelter.

The area between (and including) the village of Chatham and Cap de Ville is earmarked for an Alcoa Aluminum Smelter producing 340,000 tons of Aluminum per year. By the way, that is US$10 billion dollars worth of Aluminum which exceeds the entire annual budget of the country by 4 billion. Read More

CorporateNews.org.uk
April 4th, 2005

Barclays Bank
Already fund the notorious Narmada dam project in India – and have played a ‘key role’ in financing the dam by arranging a $400 million loan to Landsvirkjun, the Icelandic power company that will run the dam.

Impregilo

Dodgy Italian construction conglomerate, in charge of building most of the dam . One of Impregilo’s consultants has already been found guilty in 2003 of offering bribes to a Lesotho hydro-electric firm, and the company itself will face another hearing before the Lesotho courts in April 2005. Impregilo were also involved in building the Argentina’s Yacyreta dam, which went almost $10 million over budget and was labeled byPresident Carlos Menem ‘a monument to corruption’ . Impregilo were also one of the firms planning to build the infamous Ilisu dam.

Invest In Iceland
Part of the Icelandic Ministry of Industry and Commerce. Promotes investment in Iceland, and seem to be one of the quasi-governmental agencies that has been pushing for the hydro dam.

National Power Company of Iceland (Landsvirkjun)
This is the company that will run the Karahnjukar dam. Initially set up to explore hyro-electric power opportunities, Landsvirkjun now supplies electricity to the whole of Iceland. Owned jointly by theIcelandic State (50%) and the two biggest towns Reykjav í k (45%) and Akureyri (5%). Landsvirkjun also take part in greenwash operations with Alcoa, such as ‘The Alcoa/Landsvirkjun Sustainability Group’, which co-oprdinates projects such as spreading hay to stop soil erosion – which won’t, however, stop the massive erosion caused by the dryung out of dammed river beds. More on greenwash in the Alcoa section. You can track the progress on the dam, day by day, on this part of their website: http://www.karahnjukar.is/en/

Alcoa
The US company that will run the aluminium smelter. Alcoa is the world’s largest producer of aluminium, serves the most industries as well as producing ‘bacofoil’. It is very influential in US as well as Icelandic poltics: Ethical Consumer described Alcoa’s operations as ‘a near textbook example of how to win friends in high places’, counting the US Treasury Secretary, Paul O ’ Neill, as one of its former CEOs. While a major polluter, Alcoa undertakes greenwashing exercises such as the ‘Alcoa forest’ project, which claims to plant ‘ten million trees’. However, in Western Australia Alcoa have simply planted trees on top of the blasted and mined remains of former forest land; the new growth cannot compensate for the loss old eco-system, resulting in substantial erosion of topsoil. Read More

By Merrick

The Icelandic government is planning to destroy the largest remaining intact wilderness in Europe by building the Kárahnjúkar dam. It will be the largest dam of its kind in Europe, creating a reservoir of around 60 sq km. It’s not just that the submerged land will be obliterated, but the land beyond the dam will be deprived of water.

The area is land of huge ecological significance, designated an environmentally protected area, the oldest surviving areas of Iceland’s original vegetation. Around 380 square miles will be directly affected, with adjacent rivers, land and sea secondarily impacted.

To give you some context, it’s a reservoir roughly the size of Oxford with devastating direct impact on a surrounding delicate unspoilt ecosystem the size of Greater London. Read More

3 March 2006
Iceland Review

Icelandic National Broadcasting Service, RÚV, continues to report on public reaction to the announcement earlier this week of a memorandum of understanding between Alcoa and the Icelandic government concerning a feasibility study for a new aluminum smelter near Húsavík.

RÚV quotes professor of economics and director of the Economics Institute at the University of Iceland, Tryggvi Thór Herbertsson, saying that the Icelandic economy is unable to handle all the projects currently being planned.

In addition to Alcoa’s proposed new smelter, Alcan and Century Aluminum are also reported to be interested in adding capacity to their existing operations in Iceland.

Other proposed state-sponsored projects include a new hospital in Reykjavík and a new road from Reykjavík to Kjalarnes, the so-called Sundabraut.

According to RÚV, Tryggvi Thór said that “nobody thinks we can carry all of [the proposed projects] out at the same time…that would be far too much.”

Jón Bjarki Bentsson at Íslandsbanki’s research department said to RÚV that if the smelters are built other export industries would run into trouble. He also said that the Icelandic economy was flexible and had adjusted well in the past, both to downturns and upswings. If the projects were to move ahead, Icelanders could expect high interest rates and a high exchange rate, said Jón Bjarki.

Pittsburgh Tribune-Review
Friday, March 10, 2006

Pittsburgh organizations dependent on philanthropic funding from Alcoa Inc. should remember that this is not your father’s aluminum company.

Alcoa, created in the Pittsburgh region in 1888, has been a fine corporate citizen. The Alcoa Foundation it created in 1952 had been very generous to local nonprofit organizations. The foundation contributed $4.1 million in Western Pennsylvania in 2001. But only $1.5 million last year. Read More

Less than an hour after ALCOA’s New York announcement about a new smelter in north Iceland 30 young people stormed the ALCOA head office in Reykjavik. They staged a noise demo and demanded ALCOA should withdraw any plans for the Husavik smelter in the north of Iceland, that ALCOA immediately stopped building the smelter in Reydarfjordur, that ALCOA should get out of Iceland for good and that all further plans for any heavy industry in Iceland be abandoned.

The protesters got past security by making enquirees about ALCOA’s policy regarding jobs for disabled people. Once the protesters were in the offices the ALCOA staff called the police who got violent as they ejected the protesters. Apparently the ‘Viking’ squad turned up and two people were hurt. According to the National Broadcasting Service one protestors’ camera was seized (illegally) by the police.

Alcoa announced today that they would possibly want to build a $1-billion aluminum smelter in North Iceland. The proposed site is about 2 kilometers outside the town of Húsavík. An area famed for strong earthquakes. (See ‘A letter to ALCOA…‘)

The decision comes after an examination of three potential locations in Iceland, including sites near Skagafjördur and Akureyri. The Husavík location was chosen in part because of the area’s potential to use geothermal activity to supply energy for the smelter, according to Alcoa representative Jake Siewert. This is clearly a greenwashing opportunity ALCOA just can’t miss.

“We don’t think there’s another aluminum plant in the world that’s powered exclusively by geothermal,” says Siewert. “And that would make this really a first of its kind.”

He added that ALCOA felt very “welcome” in Iceland and that in spite of the fact that the majority of the nation do not want to see more heavy industry in their country and half the nation think that the Karahnjukar dams are a terrible mistake.

If approved, ground would be broken outside Husavík around 2010. The smelter would generate 250,000 metric tons per year, smaller than Alcoa’s 340,000 metric ton smelter being built today in east Iceland.

The disregard for environmental considerations and low cost of energy (the price is kept secret) offered by the Icelandic government make the country very attractive for global corporations such as Alcoa, Alcan, Century and R&D Carbon to set up mega-projects.

Last week, Alcoa also entered into an agreement with the government of Trinidad and Tobago to build a $1.5-billion aluminum smelter. See ‘Alcoa facing growing protests over proposed Trinidad Smelter’ in News.

Perhaps this feeling of being so “welcome” in Iceland had something to do with the decision of the ALCOA directors not to come to Iceland this time around to make their announcement. Just in case many Icelandic people would take to the streets yet again to protest against ALCOA’s pressence and tell them to to go to hell.