01x02 - Episode 2

[bunniefuu]

I'm on the rugged edge of Europe,

visiting five Nordic countries.

Incredible. It's incredible.

Travelling through glorious forests

and spectacular fjords.

I think Norway has a solid claim

to be the most beautiful country
in the world.

I mean, look at it!

Wow. Dogs pulling a car.

It's more than half a million
square miles of extremes.

This is low, Bent. This is low.

This is my life.

Somebody's holding on to me, yeah?!

Now breathe, breathe.

Off we go.

I'm hoping to understand
how they built

some of the happiest societies
on the planet...

Hey, guys.
Morning.

Good morning.

LAUGHTER

And who have we got here?

What...?

LAUGHTER

Hello! Welcome, welcome!

This is the most traditional Danish
lunch I have seen. Yes.

..and why they now feel
they're in the firing line.

Santa Park is also a nuclear bunker?

Yes. Very much so.

They are preparing to defend
Finland.

g*nf*re

Bloody hell.

You're wearing these
in urban Sweden?

Yes.

There's another side to Scandinavia.

Ready to fire?

On this second leg of my
Scandinavian journey,

I'm travelling from the west coast
of Norway

across the North Atlantic to the
volcanic island of Iceland.

Norway's shoreline is gouged and
carved

by spectacular fjords and islands -

almost a quarter
of a million islands -

along the longest coast in Europe.

Second longest in the world.

Rex is checking out
the coastline here.

It is fairly astonishing.

Norway does have an almost
excessively rugged,

jagged, fragmented coastline.

Since the time of the Vikings,

when they weren't out doing
a spot of pillaging,

people here have fished
and farmed their sheep.

For Roy and Inger Oksnes,
this is home.

They're taking me to a small island
where they keep their family flock.

Let's go. Are you ready to go?

After you. All right.

Well, I think the dog is going to be
doing most of the work

ROY WHISTLES

Hey, look, there they are.

ROY WHISTLES

I sense Rex wants to round up
the sheep.

Tell us what to do, Roy.

ROY WHISTLES

Er, they're making a break!

ROY SHOUTS

Ah-ah-ah!

There's a breakaway flock
over there.

Another flock over here.

I mean, they do say a flock of sheep
comes with a flock of problems.

So, Simon, did you get the speed?
Heating up?

I'm warming up Roy, I am.
You're warming up?

It gets the blood flowing,
that's for sure.

You feel the blood flowing,
blood flowing, very good.

You love it, don't you? I can tell!

Yes, and we get some exercise
out of it.

Mush! Mush! Mush!

Roy's family have farmed these
remote islands for generations.

Each year, when summer arrives,

it's shearing time for Roy
and his burly lads -

or rather for the sheep.

There we go.

Well done, guys. And they're in.

After Vikings here put down
their battle axes,

Norway spent centuries as almost
a rural backwater of Scandinavia.

Only around 3% of the land
is farmable.

The sea up here is harsh
and dangerous.

Many struggled.

What was life like here
for your parents, your grandparents?

Other Scandis viewed Norwegians
as country bumpkins.

They were the butt of jokes.



Then, 50 years ago,
everything changed

when the Norwegians hit the national
equivalent of a Vegas jackpot.

So, it's 9:30 on a Wednesday,

and Roy is off to work.

So, this is where you work?

Yes. I work on the other side
of the plant.

Look at the size of this.

This tangled eruption of pipes
and chimneys is Mongstad...

..home to Norway's biggest oil
and gas refinery.

Roy is one of more than 1,000 people
working here.

You wear it well.

Ah, it's the belt, isn't it?

Roy's family farm is now
just a sideline.

During the week,
he works for Equinor,

Norway's largely state-owned oil
and gas company.

He belongs to a lucky generation
of Norwegians

gifted one of history's biggest
Christmas presents.

All right.

It was the night before
Christmas Eve, 1969.

Norway discovered oil
in the North Sea.

It was their last attempt.

They were about to give up.

What they found became the largest
oil field ever discovered at sea

anywhere in the world.

Oh, my God.

So, this is a tanker coming in
empty or full?

This is an empty tanker coming in
for loading crude.

It's like a four-storey metal wall
just moving in front.

It's colossal.

Little bit away from the
mooring lines.

Over the last 50 years,

this small nation of farmers
and fisherman

has sucked out trillions of pounds'
worth of oil and gas

from under the North Sea.

They pump more of the stuff per head
than even Saudi Arabia.

You live quite a double life, Roy.

Ja... One moment, you're with
your sheep and the next...

Have we got enough? Ja.

I'm going to really mess this up,
aren't I?

I don't think so.

In front of these burly bloody
Norwegians.

Good afternoon.

Say when, sir.

Whenever you're ready. Yeah.

Thank you. He's got it.

Yep. Look at that.

The job is done.

So now you can start to work
in the oil business.

They're loading this tanker
with enough oil

to fuel more than one million cars
with petrol -

all of it for export.

But at home, at least,

Norway's enthusiastically adopted
green energy.

They have the highest number
of electric cars

per head in the world -

and most of them have ditched
their gas boilers

for electric heat pumps.

Just a little bit of
a contradiction.

Hardly any of this oil is actually
used here in Norway.

Norway sources almost all
of its electricity

from cleaner, greener
hydroelectric power -

thus absolving itself of any sort of
direct consumer guilt.

They're a little bit like
a drug pusher, really,

who refuses to use
their own product.

But they will very happily sell it
to almost anyone else.

With sanctions on Russia,

Norway's now the biggest supplier
of gas to the UK and Germany.

It's a trade that has helped to make
the 5.5 million Norwegians

among the richest people
on the planet.

An hour down the coast is Bergen,
an oil boom town,

but not like any I've ever seen.

It really looks like Diagon Alley
from Harry Potter.

If you were expecting oil bling
like Abu Dhabi or Houston,

or somewhere like that, think again.

Here, they spent a lot of their
oil money restoring old Bergen.

Lovingly restoring it.

It's all very understated
Scandinavian.

Of course, in many countries,
discovering oil

doesn't always bring benefits
for the people, the masses.

Often it fuels corruption,
and even w*r -

or a pampered elite just fritter
away the oil billions.

But to their credit, at least here
even ordinary Norwegians

have shared in the oil bonanza.

Alf? Yes!

Hello, Alf. Hello.

I'm Simon.

Hello, Simon.
It's lovely to see you.

I've got a slightly
fractured finger,

so I'll go with that one.
Ja.

Hello. Welcome here.

Thank you very much. Carolina?
Hello, Simon.

Hi, Carolina. Simon. Yes, hello.

Nice to meet you.
Nice to meet you, too.

Well, come on board. Yes.

All right. Thank you.

Alf Roald Saetre and Carolina Saetre
are local entrepreneurs.

Ah, straight into the cabin.
Yes. Straight in.

I definitely should not be here.

The lives of Norwegians -
all of them -

have been transformed by oil.

Alf comes from a humble background -
his family were oyster farmers -

and he's still obsessed
with seafood.

Locals have given him a nickname.

Oyster Dundee, named after
Crocodile Dundee?

Yeah. But I've been working
with oysters.

I still have a big knife also.
You have a big knife? Yeah, yeah.

I'm sure you do. Yeah.

Back in the 1970s,
Alf started working

on some of the first oil rigs
out on the Norwegian side

of the North Sea.

So you were a trained
submarine pilot?

Yes. You trained in Edinburgh,

and that was to pilot
the submersibles

that were servicing the oil rigs?
Servicing.

Yeah, and bringing divers down
in the local submarines.

So we did various jobs
for the oil industry.

So you were there really during
the birth of Norway's oil industry?

Yes, we were pioneers.

It was a great time, actually.

Yeah, I really loved it.

What's sort of the coldest
temperature you would dive in?

Around four degrees here.

That's pretty dam chilly.

This neoprene isolates quite a lot.

Yeah. And good blood as well?

Good Viking spirit?
Yeah, Viking blood, you know?

LAUGHTER

Now aged 72, these days
Oyster Dundee

dives down for shellfish.

OK. Well, good luck and stay safe.

Yeah.

Are you happy with him diving?

Oh... Oh, you're making a face.

It makes me nervous a little bit.

Hello! Hey, how was that?

That was very nice.

SIMON LAUGHS

"Very nice."

Good.

You can pull it up.

Pull it up? All right. Yeah.

See what we got.

Oh, right. Quite the catch.

Wow!

There we are. There we are. Back.

Really nice.

Excellent.

I got some really big ones.

So I go in with the knife
and cut it.

And...

It just pops open. Yeah.

Normally they throw the gills away,

but actually there's a lot
of taste in it.

So you can eat it, yeah.

And it's so good to eat, you know?

But this bit of the scallop
is the best, no?

Yeah. Thank you.

When you eat the scallop,
this is the muscle itself.

Mm! You can feel it works!

Well, I'm admiring what it does
for you.

Yeah.

This is very healthy food.

And my father,
he ate this all his life,

every day,

and he got so old
that we had to k*ll him.

LAUGHTER

Actually, why am I
laughing at that?!

A shocking story.

So it's so very, very,
very healthy.

This is the other problem
in the sea now, isn't it?

Ja. Little bits of plastic
floating around.

I hate plastic in the water.
Oh, you're going in?

Wahey!

LAUGHTER

Well done, Alf! Well done!

That is how people should
respond to it.

Well done.

Like many other Norwegians,

Alf earned decent money
in the oil industry.

He invested his earnings and became
a successful businessman.

Where are we going now, Alf?

We are heading towards the little
tiny island that nobody lives on.

It's only a restaurant,
Cornelius restaurant.

And this is your restaurant?

Yes, it's my restaurant.

OK.

Alf named his restaurant Cornelius

after his oyster-farming
grandfather.

Hello! Hello, hello!

Come along and have a look.
All right.

There you see running water. Yeah.

So I keep my scallops and stuff...
Nice and fresh.

It's nice, huh? Yeah.

This is where you can see how
well-off Norwegians are.

Private ferries often bring more
than 200 guests a night.

So you heard about me?

Yes. I told her. I told her.

OK. Very sexy guy out there.

LAUGHTER

Diners can pay more than
£150 a head -

and that's without wine from
Alf's walk-in cellar.

What's the most expensive bottle
of wine you've got here?

This is the most expensive one.

It's actually £8,000.

£8,000 bottle of wine!

There's few signs here of a
cost-of-living crisis in Norway.

Oi, oi, oi!

What is this? Thank you.

This is our bisque crab soup. Ja.

And this is the smoked salmon.

Oh, that looks very special.

Enjoy. Thank you.

When you were a lad growing up,

this was not the Norwegian reality,
was it?

No, my mother,
she knitted my clothes.

So it was...
We didn't have any money

to spend on luxury things.

And now look!

And now look, yeah.
It's quite a change.

So I think about it more or less
every day, actually.

What, your good luck?

Yes, how lucky we are
that we have been born here.

To be born Norwegian -

that's winning a lottery, really,
isn't it?

It feels like it. Yeah.

I think we're just in time.

Hiya.

I think this is right.

I was taking the overnight train
to Norway's capital city, Oslo.

So, let's have a look at this.

Ooh!

It's a bit sort of
prison-cell chic -

but not bad.

Didn't sleep too badly.

It's a little bit like being
rocked in a cradle.

For many years, Norway had
the second highest GDP

per capita in Europe -
after tiny Luxembourg.

And all that money wasn't
splashed out

on Lamborghinis and Prada handbags.

It went on wages,

state spending,

and into just about the biggest
pot of dosh on the planet.

In the 1990s, Norway took the
decision to save and invest

a huge chunk of their earnings
from oil and gas

for the future.

They set up a giant national
savings account -

a sovereign wealth fund,
as they're called.

It's now the single largest
in the world.

So here we are.

This looks just like any other
corporate office, doesn't it?

But this is definitely not some
paper wholesalers in Slough.

What goes on in here affects
the lives

of millions of people
around the world.

This is the headquarters of Norway's
sovereign wealth fund.

The fund is a financial colossus.

It's one of the largest single
stores of wealth ever assembled.

Maybe the biggest.

The fund owns global infrastructure,

ports, airports, chunks of major
world cities,

and roughly 1.5% of all the stocks
and shares listed

in the entire world.

Thank you.

The fund is worth the equivalent
of nearly 25,000 tons of gold.

Look, online, there's a website

which shows the actual market value
of the fund in real time.

It is a staggering sum.

So this is in Norwegian kroner,

but in pounds it's more
than £1.2 trillion.

That is an almost
unimaginable figure.

For me, the best way of
understanding

how much a trillion is,

is to convert it into seconds.

So, rather than thinking of it
in pounds,

think of it in seconds.

A million seconds is almost


A billion seconds is more
than 31 years ago.

But a trillion seconds is more
than 31,000 years ago.

A trillion is a huge figure.

All right. Thank you.

I'd come to see the fund's
chief of staff,

Trond Grande.

Trond? Hello, Simon Reeve.

Nice to see you. Nice to meet you.

I know you're very busy. Absolutely.

Can we come in? Of course.

Oh, fantastic.

And you've got a book here.

What is this? Pressure.

Pressure. "Lessons from the..."

"..Psychology of Penalty Shoots."

You're a man who deals with pressure
that most of us cannot comprehend.

Yes, but I think we all do, right?

And the point he tried make was,
you know,

how can you prepare
for the pressure?

This is a colossal store of wealth.

Of course, it's just a staggering
amount of money.

But I mean, honestly, for us,

it's just another kind of
three more zeros

or six more zeros,
or nine more zeros. Right?

You become slightly kind of
blind to the size of it.

Mm.

The Norwegians spend less from
the fund each year

than the amount it's increased by.

So it's just grown and grown.

So sensible and Scandinavian.

Can you imagine how good you have
to be at delaying gratification

and thinking long-term when you've
got an ice cream store

right outside your office?

How on earth do you cope with that?!

That is a source of temptation.

It is.

I think this says a lot about you.

About restraint? Yes!

Well, we have to fill it
quite often, right?

Some people tend... Yeah.

Especially now during summer.

Late afternoon, grab an ice cream
and stay outside.

Yeah, but look at your washboard
stomach there.

You're clearly not eating
all of these, are you?

I'm leaving it to everybody else
to eat, yeah.

Look, this cannot...
Trond, I'm sorry.

Yeah. I've just seen another...

This is brilliant. This is... Yeah.

Is this how decisions are taken?

Look at this. Yeah.

So, it has buy...

..sell, hold...

..or panic.

LAUGHTER

This is a decision-making cube...

Absolutely essential to
what we do, yeah.

..for anyone who trades in
stocks and shares.

Look, what's it going to come up as?

Panic. Panic?! Panic.

LAUGHTER

Thank you very much.

So, who's actually rolling
the dice here?

Where are we going now?

Now we're going to the
trading floor.

Oh, sorry. OK. Please.

So, this is essentially where
the action happens.

What's going on here?

Can you tell us anything?

What are you doing?

Yeah, today is month end.

So, then, we have fundings
or defundings.

Which means buying and selling?

Yes. A lot.

A lot. Yes.

Define a lot.

Yeah, right now it's


You look remarkably calm...

LAUGHTER

..for somebody involved
in such activity,

fuelled by Coca-Cola.

I've done many times before.
Of course you have.

We have a good system,
so I know it's taken care of.

Most Norwegian oil and gas wealth
goes to the state.

Their fund is now large enough
to support Norway's schools,

welfare and hospitals
for generations to come.

Historically, Britain extracted
more oil and gas

from its North Sea drilling area,

but much of the revenue went
to companies.

Some argue it boosted our economy,
others that we squandered it.

Either way, we never set money
aside like the Norwegians.

As a Brit, I am left thinking
what might have been.

It's lunchtime.

Yeah. Need to grab something to eat.

I feel a bit weird
being out here with you.

I feel like... "This is Trond!

"This is Trond!"

I'm not famous.

But...almost, why not?

Because you hold...

Through the fund, you hold the
future of everybody here.

Y-You...

It is true? Yeah.

The billions they've earned from
oil and gas has given Norwegians

one of the world's highest
standards of living...

After you.

..but, of course, pumping out all
those fossil fuels

has contributed hugely
to climate change.

What are you going to have?

I would love the prawn...

Shrimp sandwich, please.

So, do they make up for that
with their Wealth Fund?

They do follow some ethical rules -

avoiding dodgy regimes
and big tobacco -

but mostly it's run for pure profit.

Ultimately, the Norwegian government
controls the fund,

and has instructed Trond
to invest up to just 2%

in renewable energy.

Why so small?

Well, it could be up to 2%.

Mm.

And we are now at 1...

Sorry, 0.2%.

Something like that.
So there's a long way to go.

So, you've got a tiny percentage
of the fund at the moment

invested in... At the moment.

..renewables, in sustainables.
Yeah, yeah.

I suppose my worry, as an outsider,

looking at this incredible fund
that you've built,

is still its investments...

I don't feel like it's aggressive
enough as a national fund. Mm.

Aggressively investing
in the future,

in renewables,

in green cement,

in developing green steel,
for example,

which Norway could create.

There must be people saying,

"Trond and the fund should be
investing more in such and such."

No, absolutely. All the time.
A lot of pressure? Yeah.

We're trying to keep this fund
as apolitical

as possible in Norway. Mm.

So all we do is with
a financial return in mind.

Not for ethical reasons? No.

But it wouldn't be right for us,
as the managers of the fund,

under the mandate that we're given,

to do anything else
than what we're told to do.

So that aggressiveness,

aggressiveness or change of
direction or pressure,

needs to come from the ultimate
owners of the fund.

Norway. Norway. The people.

Yeah. No, absolutely. Absolutely.

And there's not overwhelming
pressure here to change direction.

Norwegian politicians say they
extract oil more cleanly

than other countries,

and their fossil fuels allow Europe
to reduce reliance on states

like Russia and Saudi Arabia.

Critics say Norway's too dependent
on the fossil fuel economy,

that Norwegians are sitting
rather too happily

on their pile of oil money,

are becoming less entrepreneurial
than other Scandis

and aren't really facing-up to their
national role in climate change.

So not everyone here supports
the oil economy

and the policies behind it.

I met up with musician
and campaigner Bente Lorentzen.

I think the oil industry has done
a very, very good job

in sort of selling a story
to the Norwegian people

about the oil adventure

and how it suddenly turned
our entire society

into a very wealthy one.

But there's a huge part of the story
that's left out.

Which is? Obviously a big part
of the story that's left out

is the environmental impact.

Bente was taking me to her home
village in northern Norway,

where she's been fighting a battle
against the oil industry.

It was a journey of around 700 miles
by rail and sea,

into the Arctic Circle

and up to a remote corner
of the country.

Bente grew up here,

in the idyllic fishing village
of Henningsvaer.

Permission to come on. Hi!

She arranged for her old friend,
Captain Havard,

to take us out in his fishing boat.

OK. Hi.

Thank you.
I'm looking forward to this.

Oh, come on!

Ha!

I think Norway has a solid claim

to be the most beautiful
country in the world.

I mean, look at it!

I do not say that lightly,

but this really does it for me.

Everywhere I'm looking
in the distance,

there are the misty mountains.

It gets me here.

On the edge of the Arctic Ocean,

this is one of the world's most
important fish spawning areas.

The Lofoten Islands attract
spectacular wildlife -

including orcas, sperm whales,
seals, otters,

kittiwakes and puffins.

Havard decided introductions were
in order with some of the locals.

Ah, it's coming. It's coming.

No!

Wow! What?!

Incoming!

Oh, wow! Oh, my gosh!

I really felt that in my heart.

Boom! And it's off!

Yeah.

To feed the kids.

To feed the kids. Yeah.

They call this
a particularly vulnerable

and valuable area.

Because if you look at the
Lofoten Islands as a whole... Yeah.

..it's kind of like a small arm
sticking into the deep ocean.

And it creates this magnificent
gathering of plankton and food

for the seabirds and the fish,

which again attracts whales.

Some of the whales that
we have here,

they swim from the west coast
of Africa

to come right here to get
their favourite food.

That's quite a privilege and
responsibility, isn't it?

Yeah.

Given that the Norwegians have
already earned a few bob

from the fossil fuel industry,

you might think they'd try to keep
the Lofotens,

home to some of Europe's largest
seabird colonies, pristine.

But no.

For years and years and years,

they tried to open this area
for exploration

and oil and gas activity.

This area in particular,

we're talking of a concentration
of wildlife

that's unique in the world.

If an oil spill would happen
in this area,

it would take less than 24 hours
for the oil to reach shore.

So you're talking about the risk
of disruption

as they explore for oil,

and potentially destruction
if something goes wrong?

Yeah. Which, of course, it has done
numerous times around the world.

Yeah.

There could be up to three billion
barrels of oil

under the seabed here -

and, of course, oil-dependent
economies want to buy that,

to run cars and generate
electricity,

but a group of locals said no.

Bente helped found the People's
Action for an Oil-free Lofoten,

a grass-roots group.

More than 7,000 people joined.

Bente was one of the leaders
of a campaign

to stop the oil and gas industry
coming to these islands.

And what's incredible is they won.

Drilling's been stopped here,

but Norway's still one of the top
global oil and gas producers,

pumping out almost two million
barrels of oil every day.

Well, campaigners here
won that battle,

but Norway been described
as the most aggressive

explorer for new oil and gas fields
in Europe.

It's awarded hundreds of exploration
licenses over the last decade -

and just earlier this year,

Norway became the first country
in the world

to allow commercial mining
of the seabed,

even though campaigners and experts
have warned

that could be catastrophic
for marine life.

One day, Norway's oil will run out,

but they do have another
great resource -

the sea.

Orca!

Oh, my God!

Right in front of us!

I have never been so close!

One, two, three, four, five.

Six maybe.

Seven!

They came up, they had a play,
and they went back down.

Norway is second only to Canada

for the longest coastline
on the planet.

So, for centuries,
the Norwegians have used

the bounty of the ocean.

The deep, cold waters
off the coast of Norway

have always offered amazing fishing.

But the small communities
along the coast,

over decades, transformed themselves
from fishermen to fish farmers.

Dotted along Norway's coast

and through many of its fjords
are now huge fish pens,

collectively holding -
in particular -

hundreds of millions of farmed
Atlantic salmon.

Norway now produces half of all
the world's farmed salmon.

It's a huge business,

worth almost £10 billion a year.

The industry's come in for
serious criticism -

especially about pollution.

In places, the concentration
of fish poo

and chemicals used to treat
the salmon

have been devastating for
the environment.

It's a type of factory farming.

And now they've supersized
their operations.

This is Havfarm 1.

The world's largest offshore
fish farm.

Oh, my goodness.

Inge, it's absolutely enormous!

Yes. Look at the length of this!

It's 385 metres.

It's 35,000 tonnes of steel.

And the depth is 50 metres depth.

Nearly as long as
an aircraft carrier.

I think it's 50, 60 metres longer

than the biggest aircraft carrier,
actually.

Inge Berg is a billionaire -

one of the godfathers of Norwegian
fish farming.

He had this built in China.

It's thought to be the largest
structure ever transported

on a heavy lift vessel.

Inge claims it's improved
or resolved

many of the problems with
the fish farm industry.

When it's bad weather, it's not
so easy - like this today.

Yeah, I can imagine.

Six cages like this.

And I can see some of the fish
jumping here. Yeah.

How many fish have you got here?

Today, I think there are 2.2 million
in total.



In total, yeah.

In the whole... Yeah.

That is staggering.

Why didn't you want to be
in a fjord?

Why did you want to be offshore?

In the fjord, it's become
more controversial to be there.

Here, you see,
there is nothing around us,

so we don't see any
environmental footprint

of this production so far.

Inge says, by positioning this
out at sea,

the tons of poo from the fish
will be diluted and washed away -

rather than settling on the floor
of a fjord,

damaging the marine environment
and wild salmon populations.

Apparently it's time for feeding.

Just a handful of people work here.

Feeding and pretty much everything
is automated and high-tech.

Instead of using chemicals to tackle
another problem

with farmed salmon, they use lasers.

So, this is called a Stingray. Yeah.

And this is to combat
a major problem

that farmed salmon have, isn't it?

Which is that they get lice -
salmon lice - on them? Yeah.

We are using this to remove
the salmon lice.

How much does a laser unit
to zap salmon lice cost?

Very expensive.

LAUGHTER

Yeah, I can imagine.

It's thought 90% of the planet's
wild fish stocks are over-fished.

Over the last century,
life in our oceans

has taken an absolute hammering.

The fish farm industry claims
it's better for our oceans

if we eat farmed fish
rather than wild fish.

The industry's grown dramatically,
massively.

More than half of all fish
and shellfish

consumed by humans is now farmed.

We headed back to land to see where
they zap salmon lice with lasers.

So, here we have the
operation centre.

Goodness me.

We are measuring everything

and we are having control
of the water quality

and temperature and everything.

And I can see on the screen here -
there's a zap, basically.

Yes, the red one is the pulses.

Right. It's detecting the lice
on the fish

and sh**ting it.

Does it dislodge the lice?
Or it kills the lice?

It kills it.

Grills it.

Grills it. Yes.

Inge claims this is one of the most
efficient methods

of meat production -

with low inputs of feed.

How does the conversion of feed
to fish compare with other...

Yeah, you can see here.
..farm products?

We are one kilo feed to produce
one kilo fish.

When you see a chicken,

it's close to two kilo feed to
produce one kilo of chicken.

And I think pork is close
to three kilo feed

to produce one kilo pork.

To balance sustainability
with feeding

all the people who want to eat
animal protein,

that ratio matters.

All right, I'm ready to go in.

The salmon are k*lled
by electrocution

and then processed.

This is mechanical fish gutting.

I think I'm going to have
nightmares about this.

I feel torn seeing this.

I may well have eaten salmon

that's come through this factory.

It's definitely a better form of
industrial fish production

than in may other fish farms.

But I find it quite hard to witness

this sort of industrialisation
of farming, of fishing.

It's hard to stomach.

The industry argues that, done as
cleanly and humanely as possible,

fish farming can help protect
wild stocks of fish

from being further decimated.

But all forms of fish farming
are controversial

for welfare and environmental
reasons.

The long-term impact of this
new factory is not yet known.

In midsummer,

in the far north of Scandinavia,

the days are endless.

Oh, this is weird.

So, it's now nearly 11:20
on a Sunday night...

..and the sun is out.

Because this is the land
of the midnight sun.

And I've got to tell you,
it's a bit odd.

It's doing my head in.

Even with the sun up at night,

Scandinavia still feels
familiar for a Brit.

Then I was driving
into a small town,

heading towards a bed for the night,

when I spotted something
that I think

illustrates a key difference.

Oh, my goodness.

Oh, we've got to see this.

Look at this!

All of these flowers have been
left out here overnight.

It's actually even more astonishing.

So, this is...

This is like an honesty shop.

They've just left all of this open

and are trusting people to pay
using a QR code here,

or you can give this code on an app

to buy what's here.

They've just left this!

Flowers, chocolates, vases.

SIMON GASPS

Alcohol-free, but still.

As a Brit, I was immediately
thinking how,

in most towns elsewhere,

this place would be robbed
or vandalised.

But Scandinavia is special.

There's stock out here and in there

worth thousands of pounds.

This for me, I think,
is one of the greatest,

clearest examples I've seen

of something that is central to the
success of modern Scandinavia,

and that is trust.

They have trust in their community,

in their government
to a large extent,

and in each other.

But they've got it.

And I think we've lost it.

It was time for me to leave Norway

and its spectacular Lofoten Islands.

I travelled across the
North Atlantic

to visit another branch
of the Scandi family.

Iceland is a volcanic outcrop
of fire and ice -

not even the size of England.

And with a tiny population -
about the same as Leicester.

Geographically, this isn't
strictly part of Scandinavia,

but the links are strong.

Genetically speaking,

Iceland is definitely Scandinavian.

It was largely created by,
let's be honest,

outlaws from western Norway -

and they still speak a version
of Old Norse.

So I'm an outlaw now?

Yeah, are people going to take
offence at that?

No, we're partially insane.

SIMON LAUGHS

Cross the Atlantic and then live on
a volcanic island with no food.

Yes, that doesn't sound like the
wisest move by your ancestors.

Helga Torfadottir is going to
be my guide in Iceland,

a place quite unlike anywhere
I've ever been.

So, what is...? What is this?

This is the newest addition
to Iceland.

This is all new lava flow around us?
Yeah.

Yeah. Wow.

It's been raining,
but the lava's still hot.

So, when the water hits
the lava flow,

it just turns into steam.

Can we stop just up here?
Is that possible?

That is an astonishing sight.

As well as being one of those
partially insane Icelanders,

Helga's a volcanologist.

So this is your world?

This is my world.

And my playground, actually -
my office.

I think, for most of us
on the planet,

we take stability...
really, for granted.

But not here.

Well, we have to live with it
and work with it somehow.

Like, nature is in charge

and we just learn as we go,
I guess.

This cooling lava's from the
Sundhnukur volcano -

a fissure eruption destroying
everything in its path.

We're going to go into the town
of Grindavik.

Is it safe to go in there?

Well, not really.

The future of Grindavik
is a bit unsure.

More than 3,000 people living
in Grindavik

were evacuated before the
volcano erupted.

Oh, do not want to drive here.

Earthquakes from the eruption opened
up deep chasms beneath the town.

The town is sort of, like,
masking a little bit

what you should be seeing
naturally below.

Right.

It's not just Grindavik.

Even the area around
the capital city, Reykjavik,

is under threat from nearby
volcanoes and earthquakes.

The whole island is
a volcanic island

and there's threats everywhere,

depending on how you look at it.

Our kind of motto in life here
in Iceland

is "thetta reddast" -

which means it will work itself
out somehow.

But people also think,

"Well, not in my lifetime.

"Of course we're not going to have
a catastrophe in my lifetime."

Mm. But it has to land on someone's
lifetime, and we are that lifetime.

Iceland's volcanoes aren't just a
threat to people who live here.

In 2010, you might remember,

an ash cloud from an eruption
drifted across Europe,

shut down airspace and grounded
thousands of flights -

the largest air-traffic shut-down
since World w*r II.

Yet, in historical terms,
that was just a baby.

So we just stopped by the side
of this track

to have a look at this colossal
lava field here.

So, this is the lava

from one of the largest eruptions
in recorded history.

The Laki eruption of the early


So, under here, there is stone...

..from lava, basically,

and then on top of that has grown
quite a delicate moss.

That was an eruption that
had enormous consequences

for Iceland,
but also for the world as well.

So much debris was spewed out
during the eruption,

into the atmosphere,
that there was a haze

that could be seen in the sky
from Europe

to China and Japan.

It affected crop harvests.

It caused changes
to weather systems.

It's even thought to have created
poor harvests in Europe

which led quite directly

to the hunger and the famine

which was one of the main drivers
behind the French Revolution.

So don't imagine that events
that happen far away

can't have extraordinary
consequences.

So, big questions for volcanologists
like Helga

are which one's next?

And how bad could it be?

To find out, she took me off-road.

We headed up onto Myrdalsjokull -
one of Iceland's 269 glaciers.

It is so stark up here.

Life is reduced down
to such basic elements.

Black and white.

Glaciers cover around 10%
of Iceland.

Due to climate change, many glaciers
have retreated exceptionally fast

over the last two decades.

It's feared they could lose half
their volume

by the end of the century.

We're taking it pretty slowly just
because this is a fragile surface.

There are crevasses -

and we do not want to fall into one.

We're now really up on top
of the glacier.

You feel quite exposed up here.

No, I did not see a crevasse!

This glacier ice cap is enormous -



with an average depth of 200m thick.

But what's happening below the ice
is what Helga wanted to show me.

So, just recently here...

..they made quite an amazing
discovery.

An ice cave!

Continue forwards.

Underneath millions of tons of ice,

this cave shows what lies
further beneath our feet.

What are you seeing there?
This is...

..ash.

Ash?

From a volcanic eruption?

Yes, from a volcanic eruption

from Katla volcano,

which is just below us here.

There's a volcano, what,
underneath us?

Over there? Where?

Basically underneath us, yes.
We're within Katla now.

Which has erupted before?

Last eruption was in 1918.

That was a big expl*sive eruption.

And this is the ash from that.

So, this ice contains secrets, then?

A lot of secrets.

Above us, the glacier's like
a heavy lid

sitting on a pressure cooker
below us -

the whopping Katla volcano.

The rate we're melting the glacier,

it will release the pressure
on Katla.

And if Katla has a shallow
magma store

that technically is ready to erupt,

you just need to set it off
by a little pressure release -

similar to opening a soda bottle,
you see the bubbles rise,

that you're relieving pressure
from the soda.

That's a very similar thing here.

Just so I understand it -

this glacier is almost like
a giant ice cap...

Yes. ..on top of the Katla volcano?

And its enormous weight -

billions of tons of frozen water -

that compresses the tectonic plate,
no less, underneath it. The crust.

The crust of planet Earth. Yeah.

As that melts away,

it makes a volcanic eruption more
likely and more powerful?

More likely - not necessarily
more powerful.

It's a rapid melting,

which then results in a rapid
movement of the crust.

I don't think we should spend any
more time here. After you.

Thanks.

Need to get out of here.

So, Helga's not happy with us
being through here

because it's sunny outside

and that can mean
there's an increased melt...

..and as a result,
you can get a flash flood

coming through these caves,

and obviously that could
be disastrous.

All right, well,
we made it out here.

It's a little bit safer here,

but still not guaranteed safety.

The Katla volcano beneath us
is huge,

with a caldera roughly the size
of Paris.

This has really surprised me.

The melting of Earth's glaciers

can seem like a very distant story
and problem -

but here we have a situation where
climate change

is melting a glacier that could then
unleash destructive forces

that could directly impact on tens
or hundreds of millions

of people around the world.

Katla's next eruption could be
catastrophic,

pumping out a vast ash cloud
high into the atmosphere,

polluting air with volcanic gasses,

grounding flights

and destroying harvests across
Europe and North America.

Scientists expect the heat to
flash-melt the ice cap above,

discharging flood waters
at a greater flow rate

than that of the Amazon River.

Living on a pressure cooker
isn't all bad

for the people of Iceland.

They've tapped the unstable geology
and magma below ground

to help provide masses of heat
for homes and power.

Iceland's a renewable energy
superpower,

generating so much electricity

they've set-up aluminium smelters
and host data centres -

which probably store some of
your photos

in those mysterious clouds.

And now they're using
renewable power

to remove some of the
carbon dioxide, CO2,

we've all been pumping into
the atmosphere -

a major cause of climate change.

Oh, my goodness! Yeah.

Wow.

Bergur Sigfusson is a geologist
for a firm called Carbfix.

They're into what's called
carbon capture.

So, Bergur, what is this?

These are the collector containers.

They are sucking air into these
containers.

Inside them, they have a filter

that selectively binds
CO2 from the air.

And then what comes out
of the filter

is just air without CO2.

Since the Industrial Revolution,

we've been burning fossil fuels,
coal,

cutting down our forests,

we've been pumping carbon dioxide

into the atmosphere, haven't we?
Yeah, yeah.

What's being done here
is essentially

sucking the carbon out of the air?
Yes.

What comes out here
is essentially air

with pre-industrial
CO2 concentrations.

So we're breathing some of the
purest air on the planet?

Yeah, this is something that
the Earth hasn't seen

for a few hundred years.

I'm filling my lungs. Yeah.

But then... It does taste good.

Doesn't it? It does.

There's concern about whether carbon
capture is remotely viable,

or that it might become a convenient
excuse to carry on polluting -

but there's a lot of money in it.

Companies and countries are trying
to make it work.

Voila. Voila, yeah.

Here, they think they've cracked
one of the major problems

with carbon capture -

where to safely store
the carbon dioxide, or CO2.

What have we got here?

LAUGHTER

So, earlier, the CO2 was captured
from the air.

The CO2 was then compressed
into a column,

and the CO2 was dissolved in water.

So, we have like a machine that
creates soda stream.

Just like the soda stream you drink.

Yeah, so fizzy water.

Fizzy water. Three times more CO2

than in the fizzy water that you buy
in the supermarket.

Right. And this steel pipe here...
BERGUR KNOCKS

..it goes all the way down
to 350 metres.

And here we see an example
of basalt.

Let's see this. So this...

Can I hold it?

When you look at it, it looks like
Swiss cheese, doesn't it? Yes.

And then the water goes into
these bubbles,

into the formation, and then you end
up with something similar to this.

Wow!
So, here, these white specks here.

Yes?
This is carbonate.

And this is what will
happen with time.

This is the real magic,
I think, isn't it?

You're turning fizzy water
into rock.

Yes. We are doing this
in many locations

with very good success,

and this is what we're going
to continue to do.

Make more white rocks.

LAUGHTER

By 2030, carbon capture firms hope -
optimistically -

to be removing perhaps a few hundred
million tons of CO2 per year.

It's promising,
but let's be realistic.

That's still less than 1%
of today's emissions.

I think this is great. I do.

But this is still really
small scale.

This is like trying to bail out
the Titanic with a teaspoon.

We have to reduce and stop
burning fossil fuels

that our lives and
industrialised economies

have depended upon now
for generations.

It's tough, but we can do it!

Next time, on the final leg
of my journey...

Splash down!

Off we go!

..I'm in Sweden and Denmark...

Oh, my goodness! Look at that!

Pretty raunchy.

..discovering another side
of Scandinavia.

You're wearing these
in urban Sweden?

Yes.