Reykjavík Grapevine - 02.07.2008, Blaðsíða 17

REYKJAVÍK GRAPEVINE | ISSUE 08—2008 | 17
fEATURE By Sveinn Birkir BjÖrnSSon — photoS By gaS
the next three to four years, for them, that’s a lifetime. Usually, it is
difficult to anticipate the next six months, but three years, that’s a
lifetime, so people become blinded to their own capabilities and
opportunities. They stop asking what they can do, and every op-
portunity becomes a threat to the Big Solution. You need to prove
to the nation that you really need the Big Solution, so people talk
themselves into complete hopelessness, to the level where there is
nothing else available in the situation. It becomes a battle of un-
independence. It is absurd. This idea of independence… we are
led to believe that our health-care system, our education system,
our very existence, is thanks to aluminium.
ThE GRAPEVINE: What is your goal? What is it that you want to
achieve?
BjöRk: Me, personally, I am not absolutely against dams. I could
live with dams like Sigalda and the old smaller dams, what rubs me
wrong is that we are doing it in the service of these big corpora-
tions. I came up through the grassroots, and I’ve never signed a
big contract, I’ve been offered a five-years salary for doing a car
advertisement, but I have always said no and maintained my own
independence. This is where I am coming from, and I think that is
why I am still making music today. I have total creative freedom. I
believe that we should stop thinking: “Let’s do so much awesome
with Alcoa,” but rather just do one third of what we have done with
them, but instead do it all by ourselves, own it ourselves, and make
something of it ourselves. If it is aluminium, we should make some-
thing from the aluminium here in Iceland, and put a stamp on it:
“made in Iceland,” and sell it, rather than just be a stop for primary
production. I think it so important that we own ourselves. I think
that of all the people who opposed the Kárahnjúkar dam project,
if it had been three times smaller, made by Icelanders – if this was
a innovative start-up by Icelanders – and we would maintain all
the profits for ourselves and make our own product from it here
in Iceland, I think probably half of the people who were against
Kárahnjúkar would have been of another opinion.
ThE GRAPEVINE: So for you, this is just a matter of being inde-
pendent?
BjöRk: It is not just a matter of being independent, because I am
an environmentalist as well. But I think there is a certain percent
of Iceland that is possible to dam, without going to the excesses of
Kárahnjúkar. But I do think it is important. We always continue to
be a colony. We’ve been brainwashed, first we had the Danes rul-
ing us, then we had the US Army and there was this panic when the
army left. It is like people can’t make independent decisions. The
first steps are always scary for a grassroots operation. What should
we do next? What is good for me? Or my village? My country? But
people have to stay the course for those first difficult ten years or
fifty years or what it becomes. This is something I feel I know some-
thing about. I have been a part of grassroots operation from the
start of my career, and I was a broke single mother, but I never sold
out. I stayed the course for ten years, selling books house to house
to make a living. I did everything on my own terms, and I think that
is the most important thing.
ANDRI: Think about it this way. What if we had never started to fish
cod, and now we were waiting for Alcoa or some other company
to come here and hire 40 strong men to fish cod? I mean, we built
this fishing industry on our own terms. I am not saying we should
isolate ourselves from the rest of the world. It is entirely natural
that foreign companies operate and invest in Iceland, but when a
company is here on its own terms to utilise our natural resources,
instead of being here on our terms, it becomes a very unhealthy
pattern. If Alcoa owns two smelters, one in the east, and one in the
north, they are using all the available energy in the east and all the
available energy in north, and if they need more energy, we are not
really in a position to say no to them. We are not getting that much
for our energy that we are really free. We are paying off these dams
for 40 years, while Alcoa is paying off their smelters in five years.
They are free in five years. We are always in a situation of need.
BjöRk: We need to rid ourselves of this feeling of inferiority. This
feeling that we are not as good as people in other countries. We are
like a child that is desperate for everyone’s friendship. We are on
our knees. That means we are in a very unhealthy and abusive co-
operation with these companies. My theory is that if you are strong,
secure and independent, then you are much more qualified to be
in cooperation. Then you are in cooperation on equal grounds. If
you are strong, secure and independent, you can cooperate with
aliens and still be very Icelandic. When you are insecure and des-
perate… the same rules apply in a relationship between nations
and corporations as between two friends.
ANDRI: To dam or not to dam is also a question of proportion. In
the last hundred years we have harnessed an x amount of energy.
In the last three years, we have doubled that number. In the next
three years they want to redouble it. Everything moves at 200 kph.
The excess is too much. We are not allowed to slow down. If some-
one asks them to slow down to 150 kph, that person is a fanatic. It is
the proportions that people don’t understand and it has never been
explained. Around Húsavík, there is available energy to serve one
million people. It would be possible to go into a geothermal area
and even build energy plants underground that would look like a
hot spring from the surface. This is possible, but there is no time
for that. In one phase they have to make enough energy to serve
all of Reykjavík. But that is still not enough, so they have to go into
another area to get enough energy to serve Reykjavík again, but
that is still not enough, so they have to into Gjástykki, to get a little
more, because the aluminium smelter needs so much energy. Then
they want to handcuff themselves to this smelter that always has the
upper hand, for the next forty years. The ownership of these smelt-
ers is very uncertain. We might wake up one day to find out that the
same company owns five aluminium smelters here in Iceland. In
the meantime, people have been fed words like ‘export revenue’
and led to believe that everything we have is thanks to aluminium
instead of the other way around. People don’t realise that Alcoa
saves 20 billions a year in energy expenditures by closing down a
factory somewhere else and building a new one here.
BjöRk: The world is standing at a crossroad with the future of en-
ergy right now. To nail all our energy down to aluminium smelters
right now is ridiculous. Why should we not be a part of this change?
Why should we not be a part of the innovation? We should discover
something new. I am not just thinking about saving nature now.
If I were a businessman I would be thinking forward, towards the
future. I think there would more money in that.
ANDRI: Green energy amounts to about 5% in the European mar-
ket. There are many companies in Europe that are willing to pay
premium prices for green energy. We are ruining Iceland’s image
as a green country. Our best option would be to sell green energy
to less energy-sensitive companies – something like 10 megawatts
– that desire a green image, and sell the energy at a normal price
instead of selling at cut-rate prices. That would more than make up
the difference.
BjöRk: Yes, there are other options besides aluminium smelters.
These are exciting times. It is great that we have not managed to
totally fuck up this country yet, and we are standing at a crossroad
right now. We could just jump right into the 21st century and be a
part of the solution. What we need more than anything is informa-
tion. And that is my goal with this concert.
Author Andri Snær and Björk are fighting a battle to keep Iceland independent. And preserve its nature.
my theory iS that if you are Strong, Secure
and independent, then you are much more
qualified to Be in cooperation. then you are
in cooperation on equal groundS. if you
are Strong, Secure and independent, you
can cooperate with alienS and Still Be very
icelandic.