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posted by on Thursday December 01 2016, @01:02PM   Printer-friendly
from the there's-always-money-in-the-banana-stand dept.

"Iceland is the king of the banana republics!" host Stephen Fry once declared confidently on the popular British game show "QI."

That sounds implausible: Just look at the island nation's pitted igneous landscape and brutal climate. But the claim isn't as ridiculous as it sounds. A rumor has circulated for the last 60 years proclaiming Iceland to be the banana capital of Europe.

Spoiler alert: It's not. But where did this rumor come from? Can Iceland even grow bananas? With average temperatures registering between 32 Fahrenheit in winter and a tepid 50 at the height of summer, Iceland's climate seems most suitable for growing mold and frostbite.

But Iceland's secret to agricultural innovation lies beneath the surface — way beneath.

Now we have all we need to colonize Antarctica.


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  • (Score: 2) by LoRdTAW on Thursday December 01 2016, @01:34PM

    by LoRdTAW (3755) on Thursday December 01 2016, @01:34PM (#435413) Journal

    Now we have all we need to colonize Antarctica.

    Iceland is in a unique spot. It's a volcanic island that happens to be right on a fault line which gives it an abundance of geothermal energy.

    And we have already tried to drill geothermal vents into Ross Island, home of famed McMurdo Station. Ross Island is also a volcanic island home to active volcano Mt. Erebus, as well as three inactive volcanoes: Mount Terror, Mount Bird, and Mount Terra Nova. From memory (I cant find the paper I found a few years back) they drilled two boreholes. One was around 35kft/10.7km. The other was around 4.6km/15kft. All without success. Though, I think the problem was more about money and not geothermal availability. I'm sure there is still hope as they drilled wrong or ran our of money for more drilling. Would be a good find as they could supply the station with heat and power indefinitely without waiting for fuel shipments.

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  • (Score: 2) by DutchUncle on Thursday December 01 2016, @07:49PM

    by DutchUncle (5370) on Thursday December 01 2016, @07:49PM (#435616)

    Maybe it's a volcanic island that only exists *because* it's right on that fault line?