Week 7: March 16-22

Life Cycle Assessment & Energy Efficiency Analysis was the topic for this week’s course. Dr. Paulo Ferrao of MIT Portugal led us through the basics of life cycle analysis and the concept of industrial ecology. I’ve heard a lot about bio-mimicry where nature inspires the design of a product (the bone structure of fish for vehicle frames, modeling hurricanes to improve propeller design, etc.) but industrial ecology was especially interesting as it was a systems approach which didn’t copy a specific design from nature, but rather how processes and components should interact with each other and the surroundings as a whole. The project for this week involved assessing the impact of energy created from wind turbines compared to that of other energy sources.

This week also brought some of the first real hints of spring. Although there was still a ton of snow, it was sunny and warm enough to take a bike out and explore a little bit around Skjaldarvik.
Over the weekend was out second big trip as a group. We took two vans and headed across the fjord and north to the quite town of Grenivík where we had reservations to take a snow cat up the mountain called Kaldbakur. It was a relatively short drive and we had the van for the whole day so we took our time getting there. On the way, we stopped at Laufás, which had some very cool sod houses and a nice church. Unfortunately, they were closed for the day but it was still fun to walk around and explore a bit.

When we made it to Grenivík, we went to the coast and had lunch and walked around. We had to kill a couple of hours until we were scheduled to go up the mountain so we decided to see how far we could continue driving north. Turns out, not so far but we were able to hike around the side of the fjord.
After some time, we drove to where we meet the snow cat driver. He pulled up in a huge 4x4 and even had a wireless credit card machine for everyone to pay. Luckily, he had enough extra sleds for us so we did not have to go down the mountain on the baking pans and trash bags as we had originally thought we might. There were two snow cats and each had a few rows of benches in the back. We jumped in and starting to drive up the mountain.

Wow. I still cannot believe how amazing this was. The weather was perfect and you could see for miles (which is saying a lot for being in Iceland). I was so in awe I ended up taking about 150 pictures in about an hour.

Once on the top, we took some more pictures including a group shot and of course some jumping shots.
Now, it was time to start the decent.

Turns out, sledding really fast down a mountain for about 6km can kick a lot of snow in your face. But, some were more prepared than others.

The snow was a little bit hard and it was difficult to hold an edge. I was bold/stupid enough to try to ride down holding my camera while continuing to take pictures. Luckily, I didn’t crash! Some others were not so fortunate and a few even lost their sleds in the wind and off a cliff. When we finally made it to near the parking lot area, the sun was just starting to set. We had an impromptu snowball fight, took another group picture, and loaded up to head back to Akureyri.

Week 6 March 9-15

View from the balcony at Kjalarsida:
This week was the last course for our section titled Energy Conversion and Storage Systems. Our professor was Dr. Domanski from Warsaw Institute of Technology. This week's class focused on expanding the ideas of thermodynamics and adding context to renewable applications. The ideas were related to efficiencies and how they play into policymaking decisions. We learned that the true amount of energy that is lost in the conversion and storage process is staggering. Coal power plants, for example, are usually about 40% efficient. This means that of the energy contained in a piece of coal, only 40% of it is converted to electricity. An additional 7% of this value is lost in the grid transporting it to your home. Couple with this with a traditional incandescent lightbulb, which is only 5% efficient, and we can see that less than 2% of the original energy in our lump of coal has been converted into light energy. If this process seems wasteful, this is because it is. Closing the gap in these inefficiencies is one of the easiest and pain-free ways to get some easy electricity savings. The switch to fluorescent bulbs, which will become mandatory in 2012, increases this efficiency by 4 times and would cut electricity use, and thus the cost, by 75%.

These ideas are especially important on the grand scale. It seems almost cliche to ask every household to switch just one lightbuld from incandescent to fluorescent. But it is less the act itself as the changing of minds. One fluorescent bulb is trivial compared to the lights used nightly at Fenway Park (btw opening day in a month!) It seems like fluorescent bulbs are simply a 'gateway' to other things. Changing opinions before implementing the big stuff.

The Krafla geothermal plant:

So with the end of this class days away, it was time to learn all the things that had eluded us during the lectures. Surprisingly, a large percent of the students had no thermodynamics background. The cross cultural educational differences were interesting to observe. Speaking generally, students from Eastern Europe tended to have a very numerical approach to studying, showing a quick mastery of equations and numbers. Other Europeans seemed to take a more analytical approach, easily understanding problems and working through solutions. Americans, on the other hand, seemed to have a grasp on the theory and ideology of the situations. Alltogether, this made the study sessions easier when different groups were naturally good at different topics. These subtle differences are one of the things that make our class amazingly compatible and cohesive.

Continuing with this topic of cultural differences, it is also interesting to show the influence of culture on Icelandic society.

The above picture of an Icelandic pizza with a fried egg on top shows a typical meal at a local restaurant. The invasion of fried eggs seems to extend to other dishes as well, notably pastas and hamburgers. This is presently inexplicable, but I'm sure there is some good reason for eggs invading other dishes. Other dishes laden with salt, such as fish jerky and smoked meats show how the Icelandic people adapted to the need to preserve food for the long winter months way back when. Use of salt even today shows this throwback to the old cultural need to preserve their food.
While preserving food was important, the fresh foods are also second to none. It is nice to find fish packaged in town the same day it was caught. Milk bottled within throwing distance from my apartment, and vegetables grown in geothermally heated greenhouses right up the Eyjafjordur valley. Not only is it much tastier than the less than fresh foods I have been used to at Dominick's for the past 4 years, locally sourced foods do not have to be flown in from all parts of the globe.

Week 5: March 2-8

After a nice weekend traveling as a group, we were refreshed and ready to begin the second week of RES602. Our professor for this week, Dr. Dusan Holoubek, was from the Technical University of Kosice in Slovakia. Similar to last week, he had entirely too much information to cover in a very short amount of time. Nonetheless, with our heads down and our eyes forward, we pushed on. Surprisingly for me, much of the subject matter focused on non-renewable energy technologies. We worked specifically on the details of a number of coal fired power plant technologies and nuclear reactor designs. Although a bit confusing at the time, it was important we cover this, I think, as energy solutions in the future we be from a variety of sources and to think we will be able to simply kick our addiction to fossil fuels is delusional. How it will all fit together is anyone’s guess. This culminated in a project at the end of the week. I worked in a group, which evaluated hydrogen production using next generation high temperature nuclear reactors.

The anticipation for the weekend was high as we had two big upcoming events. The first was organized by one co-author who could probably explain it much better than I. In any case, dinner was prepared and served for practically the entire class. The apartments in Kjalarsida were used. The scene was chaotic as plates, silverware, and pots and pans were used from any willing donor and the entire 3rd floor was used as the dining hall. In this picture you really can only see half of the hall that we took up.

The food was well worth waiting for and had contributions from a number of students. There were also some good drinks which was a nice change since many people were getting tired of the Viking brew, especially the Polish students who had not had any proper vodka for over a month! I think everyone had a good night.

Saturday evening held a party at the home of RES rector, Dr. Bjorn Gunnarsson in the south of Akureyri. Students from last year had told us a few stories of these parties and expectations were high. Getting to Bjorn’s home a bit difficult though. We only had the van for the Skjaldarvik students and we had to run a makeshift shuttle service. To make matters more trying, this particular night was one of the worst snowstorms I have experienced since I had arrived. The snow was heavy and wet and once outside the city, the visibility was about 30m. Once we all got to Bjorn’s, everyone forgot about the treacherous time we had getting there and had a good time. There was pizza, drinks, some board games, good discussion, and dancing - lots of dancing:


And a congo line:


Even Bjorn showed us some of his moves!

I remember specifically the short speech Bjorn gave sometime that night. He mentioned that he hoped our experience at RES would be not only educationally challenging but also one that allows us to grow outside of the classroom.

Week 4

During this week of class, events happened at lightning speed. The weekend was spent mostly studying the vast quantity of reading necessary to prepare for the test on monday. A welcome study break was simply wandering about town in search of new things. The picture above is the largest church in town. It was designed by Guðjón Samúelsson (the prestigious British architect?) and consecrated in 1940. While the building itself is quite new, Christianity has been in Iceland for more than 1000 years. According to Icelandic sagas passed down for centuries, around 990 AD the religious lawmaker in Iceland decided to abandon the old Ásatrú, or Pagan, ways and adopt christianity. Upon doing so, he threw all of the Pagan religious artifacts over the waterfall at Goðafoss, which translates to 'waterfall of the gods'. This will be mentioned again later in this post. Special thanks to Ívar for the (albeit remedial) history lesson.

With the test out of the way on monday morning, we began our second unit, Energy Technologies and Systems. This is of special interest to both of the coauthors, since it will be their eventual specialization and the culmination of months of research into (hopefully) publishable theses. The first week of this class was devoted to a review of Thermodynamics. Since this is usually only (marginally) fun the first time it is learned, we decided to take to the slopes once more to take our minds off the concepts. The weather in Iceland is very unpredictable, but in this case it was snowing quite predictably for 5 days straight. In near whiteout conditions, we made it to the slopes to experience knee deep snow as far as the eye could see:
The T-bar, behind the group in this picture was allegedly closed that afternoon due to 'avalance conditions' or 'high wind' or some other excuse given by the ticket lady at the bottom of the mountain. However, after Paul exchanged a few words with the Liftie at the top of the chairlift, he agreed to open the T-Bar for us to take a few runs in the fresh stuff. It was a magical afternoon.

There was so much snow, Kristel's skis needed to be scraped to remove some ice frozen to the bottom:
This picture is pretty indicative of the day as a whole. Note the lack of distinction between the snow and the clouds. This is expecially difficult when trying to see what you are skiing down. Your's truly had what has been described as the fall of the day. It was an olympic caliber faceplant when I hit a patch of dense windpacked snow and tumbled head first into the snow, burying myself up to the shoulders. Needless to say we were picking snow out of ourselves for the whole ride home.

After a hard week of Thermodynamics proofs and problems, we decided it was time to get out of Akureyri for the day. 34 of us piled into rented vans for a day trip to the Lake Myvatn area:
The area is about 100 km from Akureyri and has lots to see. There is the 12 m high waterfall mentioned earlier, called Goðafoss:
As well as a geothermally active volcanic area called Krafla. Hell's Kitchen is on the mountain, which has hotpots, fumaroles, steam vents, and an overpowering smell of sulfur:
As well as it's own geothermal power plant, which is one of several on the mountain:


Lake Myvatn is situated on a geothermally heated area, so parts are frozen and parts remain unfrozen, even in Winter:

You know what the Icelanders say, 'If life gives you heated water, make a nature bath'. We spent several hours in the warm waters of the Myvatn Nature Bath with temperatures up to 40 degrees C and spectacular views of the surrounding mountains. In such an idyllic setting, the time spent there still didn't feel like enough:

The road conditions were fairly treacherous, and driving in the blowing snow takes a unique skill honed on the snowiest of US roads. Fortunately the yellow posts bounded the sides of the Ring Road, otherwise road and frozen lake would easily blend into one another. Occasionally, a turnaround point was needed without any convenient spots, and one had to be improvised on the fly. Here we can see one coauthor in need of some help in freeing the van from a 3-point turn gone just a bit too far back.

Luckily the lake is not on the right side of this picture.

Week 3

The second week of class was much like the first except that everyone seemed to be a little more in the school mode. Thank goodness for the coffee machine in the back of the classroom though as I don’t think I would have made it through some of the lectures without it. The subject matter wasn’t any more positive, however. Being confronted with the very harsh realities of our energy future can be depressing, especially when you realize how much has to be done to change things. The project work was encouraging as it seemed like more people were doing work trying to solve the problem then were just running around with their hands in the air screaming.

This week was the first full week I had living in Skjaldarvik. Turns out that an old retirement home is about perfect for a bunch graduate students living abroad. The building itself is about 8km outside of Akureyri, which seems like it might be a bit of a good and bad thing. First off, we only have one 9 person van and no access to public transport so if someone wants to go anywhere, the others have to also go or stay behind. On the bright side, the area is really nice. The living area of the house backs up to a nice view of the fjord, which will be perfect for BBQ’s when the weather warms up. Supposedly, the fishing is also good so we may be able to catch dinner there one in a while.

There are 11 other students in Skjaldarvik besides myself. I have roommates from Poland, Chile, Mexico, Estonia, Kazakhstan, and Hungary. It is a little embarrassing though, as I am the only one who does not fluently speak at least two languages. Nonetheless, I am more impressed by our similarities than our differences (for good or bad, is this evidence of an increasingly globalized world society?).

On Thursday, the student group from the University of Akureyri, STAFNBÚI (which all RES students belong to), organized a pub quiz at the Café Akureyri.


They were nice enough to let me bring along two friends from Spain that I worked with this past summer, Javi and Carlos, who came to visit me. The bar had an entire keg that was free for us (and didn’t last very long at all) and prizes included shots and more beer. All in all a good time!

Friday after our group presentations was graduation for all the students who just finished. It was filled with important people such as the Ms. Katrin Jakobsdottir, the Minister of Education in Iceland, Dr. Thorsteinn Gunnarsson, the Rector of the University of Akureyri, and Dr. Kristin Vala Ragnarsdottir, the Dean of School of Engineering and Natural Sciences at University of Iceland. There was even an ear splitting (in a good way) opera performance by two local students of the music school. To top it off, there was some excellent food including some surprisingly tasty dates wrapped in bacon. Don’t judge, just try it.


Talking to the recent graduates after the ceremony was encouraging. I was told repeatedly in separate conversations that even though there were a lot of things that weren’t necessarily perfect, the past year in RES was one of the best in their entire lives. That night I drove around with Javi and Carlos exploring the city. Here is a view of Akureyri at night.


An epic day of skiing followed on Saturday, This picture of Paul shredding about sums it up.


Sunday I drove north with Javi and Carlos to the towns of Dalvik and Ólafsfjörður, which are two small towns on the fjord. Although the weather didn’t cooperate, this was my first real glimpse into rural living in northern Iceland. Lonely Planet has mentioned that Ólafsfjörður has “a real sense of rural isolation” and I would have to agree, but add to that a very strong smell of fish. The weather was pretty bad so I don't have any decent pictures worth posting. One of the cooler parts of the trip was a 3km long one-lane tunnel.


The rest of the day we spent studying for the exam from our first course. The professor gave out a study guide that helped a lot considering there was a lot of information to digest in a short amount of time.

Week 2

Week two brought many more surprises for the new group of RES students. Half of the group was still at Hotel KEA waiting for the apartments to be vacated by (pried away from) the graduating class. The other half had moved into Skjaldarvik, a converted old-folks home right on the fjord about 8 km north of town. Throughout the past few days, students that would soon be graduating began returning from their various hiding places abroad (or their dorm rooms) where they were doing thesis related research for the past trimester. Their advice, dubious at times, always seemed to stem from some invaluable life lesson:
'Find a good thesis advisor.'
'You are going to work really hard, so learn a lot, but don't be too serious about the whole thing.'
'Beware of the Polish.'
'The student union parties usually have free beer.'
'Try and find somewhere new to travel to every weekend: volcanoes, glaciers, the Arctic Circle, Faroe Islands, Greenland, etc.'
'If you get a rental van stuck in the mud, you have to pay a lot to get it towed out.'

So with these thoughts swirling in my head like the snow swirling sideways by the hotel window, the first day of class was upon us.

Waiting for the public bus to take us to class:
There is something a little bit unnerving about waiting to catch a bus to class at 9:30 AM with the sun not yet up. The folks that live in Skjaldarvik did not see their new dorm in daylight for a few days since they left in the morning and returned after 4 when it had already become dark. The school's International Director, Arnbjorn Olafsson, was acting as surrogate mother for the day, walking us to the bus stop and seeing us off. This was important since most of us could not get to the Radhustorg bus stop by ourselves if we tried.

The first day was particularly momentous for some, since they were going back to school after many years, while others had been out of school for just a few months. Our first lecture came from the Dean of Students, Bjorn Gunnarsson. It was not until now that we really understood how unique Iceland is from a renewable energy standpoint. 80% of the country's energy use and an amazing 99.5% of all electricity is powered by renewable sources, mostly by hydropower and geothermal power. The real issue holding the country back from having 100% of its energy coming from renewable sources is the dependence on petroleum for transportation vehicle use. This will be mitigated in the future as hybrid technologies are improved.

Our classroom:

This is the building where our classes will take place for the first trimester. After that, each specialization will split off and get their own room in different places. For now, everyone is taking classes together. Our first professor was Dr. Dean Abrahamson, from the University of Minnesota. His course, titled Energy: Past, Present, and Future, was a little depressing at the start. It is pretty much unanimously agreed upon in the scientific community that massive changes need to be undertaken in the next couple decades or the planet will be irreparably changed by 2050. Food supplies will be threatened, the oceans will become more acidic, new diseases will appear, weather patterns will intensify, and millions of square miles of coastline will be under water. It is possible for London to resemble Venice by the end of this century if things are left unchanged.
So with this sense of urgency and maybe just a little bit of pessimism about this immensely daunting task class began. The first few classes were very factual, and the information is not really open to interpretation. The US uses 21 million barrels of oil daily. CO2 is heinously bad if left to spiral out of control. Canada has the highest per capita energy use (that came out of left field).

That weekend, Valentines Day actually, we had a welcome event hosted by the graduating class.

Both classes in attendance:

The event was a pub quiz trivia night, with Icelandic, renewable, and movie themed questions. My team placed second and was the proud winner of 5 beers. The quiz was a welcome distraction from hotel living for us and from thesis defenses for the older students.

That Sunday, the residents of Skjaldarvik hosted a housewarming party and cooked dinner for the whole class. 6+ kg of spaghetti and a half dozen baguettes fed the group.

Waiting anxiously:

Digging in:

With the close of this week, the next would bring our first assignment, a group project and presentation. Topics ranging from building efficiency to nuclear power to country profiles were coming together into reports and powerpoints, ready for presenting.

Week One

Landing in Akureyri is in a bit of a jolting experience. No matter how many pictures you look at or descriptions you read, nothing can quite prepare you for the type of environment you are so suddenly immersed in when you step off the plane. Looking at a map of the island and comprehending that you are actually here and breathing the air as it arrives from north of the Arctic Circle is still not quite real. This is a picture of Akureyri from across the fjord.


As I arrived an entire week before classes at RES started, I had a little time to adjust. It was nice to meet the other students who arrived as it provided some outlet. We spent some time together walking around the city and exploring the sights as well as getting settled and trying to survive while waiting for some of our luggage to catch up with us. Akureyri struck me as quaint town with a close-knit community. The people seem friendly and eager to help confused foreigners.

Early on we were able to go to the local ski area (which is one the best in all of Iceland) Hlíðarfjall. To our surprise, we were able to get run after run of fresh tracks as most of the other skiers there were more interested in the race course. Here's a picture right before our last run of the night.
A few of us liked it (and the prices) so much that we bought a season pass.

Another early experience was the Icelandic initiation of trying the fermented shark, Hákarl followed by a type of schnapps called Brennivín (aka the black death). I also tried smoked and salted lamb, and sour ram testicles in a kind of jelly block called Súrsaðir hrútspungar. Icelanders don't normally eat these things but keep them around to remember the days when things were not so easy. I had a lot of trouble with everything but the lamb. My stomach was not happy with me. Chef Anthony Bourdain is said to have described the shark as "the single worst, most disgusting and terrible tasting thing" he has ever eaten. Ashlin's reaction says a lot here:

Nevertheless, it was an experience I am really glad I had. My stomach will forgive me eventually.

The initiation ceremony was the Saturday before classes started. We were lucky to have a number of guests as well as a most of the 08/09 students there for the occasion. It was a great event to really put this next year in perspective.

The following Sunday the group got the van, which will be used shuttle a number of students from where they lived to class. We had the day to ourselves and decided to drive to east to see Goðafoss and Mývatn Lake. Just driving through the Icelandic countryside is an experience in itself and to see just a taste of the amazing natural wonders that Iceland has to offer was exciting. This is Goðafoss:


And lake Mývatn:


And "Hell's Kitchen":


Once back in Akureyri, I threw all of my things in my bags and checked out of the hotel as our new home at Skjaldarvik was ready. All that was left was to get ready for class for the next week - RES601: Energy - Past, Present and Future.