Iceland no longer to be a niceland?
I read some very upsetting news this morning from Schnews. The Iceland government in some crazy orgy of insanity, are laying their ecologically pristine interior to waste for short term capitalist gain. I feel particularly strongly as Chelfyn and I spent our honeymoon in Iceland and fell in love with its pristine beauty.

As Schnews reports:"They’ve already blown part of Dimmugljufur - Iceland’s Grand Canyon - to smithereens, and if they fill up the reservoir (scheduled 2007), 65.5 square kilometres of pristine wilderness will be completely submerged. This land includes birthing grounds for the majority of Iceland’s reindeer and Ramsar ‘protected’ nesting sites for endangered species such as pink-footed geese, and Gyrfalcon. Sixty waterfalls will be lost as will a range of sediment ledges - judged completely unique in the world by scientists studying global warming - which record 10,000 years of geological and climate change. And this vast projected reservoir would extend right onto the glacier itself, which is breaking up because of global warming. Wouldn’t giant icebergs trucking up to the dam be a bit - er - dangerous? Yep. And it gets worse - the dam is being built over a seismic fault!

In 2003, Landsvirkjun’s chief, Fridrik Sophusson, was asked what would happen if there was an earthquake under the dam. “It would burst,” he smiled calmly. “A catastrophic wall of water would annihilate everyone in Egilsstadir [the nearest town] and all the neighbouring farms would be swept away.” Icelandic Tsunami anyone? “It won’t happen,” he added smugly. Yet in August 2004 there were continuous earthquakes at Karahnjukar for several days."

It breaks my heart to think that one of the world's last remaining wildernesses is being carved up by Caterpillar trucks. If you want to get involved in the worldwide protest then surf over to KillingIceland.org

Closer to home we have our own insanity with New Zealand's Mighty River Power proposing to convert 'Marsden B' (an unused oil-fired power station) into a coal fired power station. That's right COAL - the most polluting fossil fuel there is. In the same year that New Zealand ratifies Kyoto how can this be? Bigups to the Kiwi Greenpeace crew who occupied the roof at Marsden B for 9 days and blogged their vigil.

Some good news from Greenpeace is that Genesis power has put two other proposed coal power stations in New Zealand on hold. We are standing at an environmental crossroads. Let's pray we choose the right way...