The day began with a drive out to a town with a very long name: Hellisheidarvirkjun.  Don’t ask me how to pronounce it; I’m lucky if I can spell it correctly!  Here, we visited a geothermal power plant and saw an exhibition with a much simpler name:  ON.  (Actually, that’s an acronym for “Orka Natturunar.”).

We learned from our guide that only 15% of power plants in Iceland are owned by private companies; the government owns the rest.  The country runs 100% on renewable energy (geothermal and hydropower), making it one of the greenest countries in the world. 

It was interesting to learn how geothermal steam is used to produce electricity.  Iceland is fortunate to have such an amazing natural resource!  But, it was the oil crisis of the 1970’s that motivated them to take advantage of this resource and build geothermal power plants to harness this energy.

To give you an idea of how economical geothermal energy is for the consumer, it costs 0.10 -0.12 (U.S.) per unit.  For comparison, fixed rate plans where I live are running about .65 per unit and up.

Homes in Reykjavik do not need water heaters; the water comes hot directly from the plant via insulated pipes that carry the water 15 miles from the plant to their homes. 

I was surprised to hear that just 17% of the energy produced in Iceland is taken up for residential use.  Industry uses the rest – especially aluminum smelters.  They import boxite from Australia to smelt aluminum, and then export the aluminum to Germany.  Hmmm…

After hearing a presentation about how geothermal energy is produced, we had free time to see the exhibits.

Our next stop was to tour the Arbaer Open-Air Museum.  Here, we learned about the living and working conditions of Icelanders in the past.  Notice how these turf houses were very short with low roofs.  They were built this way to save money, because wood was very expensive.  How unfortunate for those who were tall!

(For all pictures, click on the image to see full screen view.)

Next up: Basking in the Beautiful Blue Lagoon

Note: If small group travel is of interest to you, I highly recommend Overseas Adventure Travel (OAT). Although Bruce and I travel together, they do not charge a single supplement for those who travel on their own. Singles also get their own room at hotels. If you book, you can get $100 off your trip by providing my name and customer number (Elaine Krugman, #3018126) as the person who referred you. I will also get $100 off future travel– a win-win!