TV station NFS recently interviewed Kristján Thór on the report’s contents. The report encourages local authorities to scale down their plans for further development of power intensive industries, citing the danger of placing all the eggs in the same basket. Kristján Thór rejects the need for an expert opinion to come to terms with the fact of economic overheating.
“For decades, communities in the north of Iceland have had firm ideas on the spin-off effects of the development of power intensive industries,” Kristján Thór said.
THE OECD report criticises the lack of transparency of available information, referring especially to the price of electricity to the Icelandic aluminium industry. Kristján Thór does not think transparency will increase through privatisation of the National Power Company. However, he acknowledges that not everyone is in favour of further development of the domestic aluminium industry. “I think there’s no greater opposition to plans for a smelter, or any other form of power intensive industry at Húsavík, than to the current development in the east of Iceland,” Kristján Thór concludes.
