So when they say 'without hot water' they actually mean 'without heating'?
For someone who isn't in Iceland that's not clear.
For someone who isn't in Iceland that's not clear.
The notion that you might heat a house with electricity or by setting trees or dinosaurs on fire is so foreign to Icelanders that they don't think this is worth clarifying in the English translation of the news feed.
It'll have other long-tail effects, e.g. some people with outdoor hot tubs in the area are probably scrambling to drain them and all their plumbing now. Some rely on constant drip heating to avoid the pipes bursting.
Why are outdoor hot tubs full in the first place when it's -10°C (15°F) outside?
Well obviously when boiling water practically bubbles out of the ground for free you're going to get in it at scalding temperatures even if you need to dig it out of the snow first. Doesn't that go without saying?
I think the hospitals have backup diesel electric generators, but in general nobody's got backup heating, except perhaps the odd free-standing electric heater.
I don't know, but I'd expect someone at the hospital there is thinking of running those in select places.
Icelandic media is now patiently explaining to people the upsides ("yay, heat!") and downsides (you might die) of running the propane gas heaters that have just sold out in enclosed spaces: https://www.ruv.is/frettir/innlent/2024-02-08-ad-ymsu-ad-hug...
Why wouldn't they be? Those are really normal temperatures to use a hot tub in.
I'm sorry but this is hyperbole. I just spent nearly a week staying in a house *in Iceland* that was heated with wood and diesel fuel. Granted, it's an old house, built about 100 years ago, but it's hardly a foreign concept.
Obviously my comment's a bit torque-in-cheek, but I've never heard of fossil fuel heating in Iceland in residential dwellings outside af Grímsey, an island 40km off the coast.
There's fireplaces, but not for heating entire building, unless it's a small summer home or a cottage.
I'm sure there's exceptions, but what I was pointing out is that geothermal heating is universal enough that the implications of the hot water being out don't need to be explained.
No heating in winter temps that far north is dangerous.