History Repeated — Skyr Thrown on Greenwashing PR Managers

March 5 2009
Yes­ter­day three black dressed indi­vid­u­als, masked with alu­mini­um foil, threw green Skyr (tra­di­tion­al Ice­landic dairy prod­uct) on rep­re­sen­ta­tives of Ice­landic ener­gy com­pa­nies dur­ing a green­wash pre­sen­ta­tion in the Uni­ver­si­ty of Ice­land. In June 2005 Sav­ing Ice­land threw Skyr on rep­re­sen­ta­tives of Alcoa and Bech­tel dur­ing an inter­na­tion­al alu­mini­um con­fer­ence in Reyk­javík.

Skyr chucked on PR greenwashersMarch 5 2009
Yes­ter­day three black dressed indi­vid­u­als, masked with alu­mini­um foil, threw green Skyr (tra­di­tion­al Ice­landic dairy prod­uct) on rep­re­sen­ta­tives of Ice­landic ener­gy com­pa­nies dur­ing a green­wash pre­sen­ta­tion in the Uni­ver­si­ty of Ice­land. In June 2005 Sav­ing Ice­land threw Skyr on rep­re­sen­ta­tives of Alcoa and Bech­tel dur­ing an inter­na­tion­al alu­mini­um con­fer­ence in Reyk­javík.

Gaia — the stu­dent asso­ci­a­tion of Mas­ter stu­dents in Envi­ron­ment and Nat­ur­al Resources, had orga­nized a “Green Week” in the uni­ver­si­ty. Among activ­i­ties was this par­tic­u­lar pre­sen­ta­tion by e.g. Landsvirkjun (Iceland’s nation­al ener­gy com­pa­ny), O.R. (Reyk­javík Ener­gy) and Geysir Green Ener­gy; all com­pa­nies who are involved in the devel­op­ment of the alu­mini­um indus­try in Ice­land.

Green­wash­No­body has claimed respon­si­bil­i­ty for the action and no press release has been sent to the media. But the his­tor­i­cal ref­er­ence is clear and one does not need a lot of imag­i­na­tion to get in mind what the mes­sage of this action was.

RÚV, Iceland’s nation­al TV sta­tion stat­ed in its evening news that Öskra!, a new­ly formed move­ment of rev­o­lu­tion­aly stu­dents, had claimed respon­si­bil­i­ty for the action. A lit­tle lat­er Öskra! sent out a press release say­ing:

Yes­ter­day green skyr (tra­di­tion­al Ice­landic food which has been used over the years in direct actions — show­ing dis­re­spect and dis­ap­proval) was thrown on the image man­agers of the ener­gy com­pa­nies that took part in the green-wash­ing days in the uni­ver­si­ty.

Öskra! — The rev­o­lu­tion­ary stu­dents move­ment, is not respon­si­ble for the skyr throw­ing action, and does not know who did it, but under­stands and sup­ports it com­plete­ly.

“Green Ener­gy” is one of the cap­i­tal­ists false solu­tions to the envi­ron­men­tal destruc­tion which threat­ens all life on earth. If the ener­gy com­pa­nies want to call them self green, they can just be green.

Green­washThe Skyr throw­ers got away and no one was arrest­ed but accord­ing to Ice­land Review, a “uni­ver­si­ty staff mem­ber caught hold of one of the activists, but lost his grip as a spec­ta­tor dis­rupt­ed him. Police are inves­ti­gat­ing the case.”

Like Öskra!, Sav­ing Ice­land announces a com­plete sup­port with this great action!