Haramsøya is being destroyed these days by the new colonial masters Zephyr and Stangeland Maskin.
Zephyr is owned by Viken county municipality and a number of eastern municipalities through the companies Glitre Energi, Vardar, and Østfold Energi, where Drammen is the largest owner with a total of 22,18% direct and indirect ownership in Zephyr. They now appear as colonial masters in another municipality in a completely different part of the country.
The inhabitants of Haramsøya do not understand what is happening. They don't understand that other municipalities can be behind the razing of their home, because the owner municipalities in Eastern Norway could hardly do something like this to their own residents on a small island? But on Haramsøya they use brute force to push forward in a cynical attempt to usurp their natural resources. In principle and form, this is not very different from how the colonial powers of previous centuries usurped natural resources in other parts of the world and countries. World history is written with greed, cynicism, exploitation and personal enrichment.
It is in this scenario that Stangeland Maskin now sees its average to secure a short-term profit. As one of the country's largest machine contractors, they must clearly be poor on money to take on such an assignment. In any case, they can hardly be particularly concerned with their own reputation when they take on such a mission, where they have to use large police forces to remove a private man sitting in his own car on his own private road to gain access to start the destruction.
Billionaire heir Olav Stangeland didn't get the best compliments from his father Trygve either when, in the book "På Min Måte" published in 2004:
Worried about the near future
When it comes to the PR part of the business, he is a little worried about the near future. Olav, the son who is responsible for the day-to-day operations, and will take over all responsibility from time to time, is indeed "completely impossible" when it comes to the sense of PR. There is no such thing as talent. "He is far too concerned with appearing serious and therefore also far too afraid of criticism!" asserts Trygve firmly.
A disaster of a reputational issue
It is no ordinary assignment that Stangeland Maskin has now taken on. Last year's heightened conflicts around wind power developments should have caused alarm bells to ring in the headquarters at Soma in Sola municipality on Jæren. Instead, they count the new millions when they ring the bell for two new wind power jobs, Måkanuten in Rogaland and Haramsøya. "RENEWED CONFIDENCE IN WIND POWER DEVELOPMENT" they call it. They call destroying other people's homes "trust".
Stangeland – Renewed confidence in wind power development
Haramsøya before and after Stangeland
Haramsøya is a small island where the hilly part of the island is surrounded by buildings. When the wind power plant will now cover the entire hill area, the island's inhabitants have no way to escape ongoing noise, nor have anywhere else to relax or go for a walk and enjoy the island's peace and quiet when the entire hill area is converted into an industrial area with gigantic wind turbines directly above the buildings. One of the reasons why people choose to settle in such places is the peace and quiet and proximity to nature. This results in lively and good local communities where they take care of and help each other. Now, without them having their voice heard, all this is now being taken away from them, and for what? Short-term cynical greed from powerful companies that don't exactly lack either money or resources. Now the same companies are going to destroy an entire society for their own enrichment. At the same time, this will also become their path. "Elefantsyka" as Trygve Stangeland called it in his book "På Min Måte" is apparently the only thing that now controls the company, its owner Olav Stangeland and general manager Tommy Stangeland.
Stangeland will pay a high price for its involvement in the project.
Why do we use a subcontractor?
This is a question that many people ask themselves, because they are not the owners of the facility. No, we are of course well aware of this. At the same time, there are such companies that both enable the implementation and that also enrich themselves from the misfortune of others. Stangeland Maskin has itself chosen to take on this assignment and must also take on the reputation that comes with it. As one of the country's largest machine contractors, they can afford to say no to such assignments. They actively use good assignments in their own marketing, so it is only fair and reasonable that they also attach importance to the bad ones. They have also had several good opportunities to pull out, both when they saw the solid resistance from a local population who do not want their local community destroyed. They could well have pulled out and shown social responsibility when they saw that large police forces were needed to remove a private person from their own private land to carry out the mission. They have already had many good opportunities to withdraw, but have instead chosen to use force against the local population to carry out the work.
Making a subcontractor responsible is in no way unnatural. With such a disaster mission, it seems strange that a billion-dollar corporation cannot afford to say no. But on the other hand, maybe it is this raw cynicism that is the reason why they are now so big?
A bit of this cynicism comes through clearly in Trygve Stangeland's book "På Min Måte" which describes a company culture that has emerged in the oil age:
Wild west
There was "an awful lot of money" in Hinnavågen, waiting for the right person. No small considerations were taken here. Everything had to happen so furiously fast, materials were bought in, used - and crushed instead of reused. No one drove a nail there," says Trygve laconically. Here there was waste of an unknown nature, and here TS was the "court supplier" of labour. The equipment he did not have, he made sure to buy as soon as the need arose. In an industry where deadlines were more important than costs, taking care of "one's good name and reputation" was as important as reliability itself.
They had bought an expensive "dozer" which ended up in the sea after a week's life. TS did not have time to carry out salvage work, and was able to buy replacements straight away. Later, when the dock was emptied of water, the drowning object suddenly reappeared. It was rinsed clean and sold relatively immediately, because when you "bath such machines in the sea, they are not very good afterwards"!
But won't it just be someone else who takes on this mission and continues if Stangeland Maskin now pulls out? Yes, of course, but at the same time they have to be very cynical and desperate to take on such a mission. It does not give any better reputation for another company than it currently does for Stangeland Maskin. Nor is it useful to say that “we were just following orders". It is no use. At least not now in 2020. Now each company is responsible for its own corporate culture and for its own reputation. At Jæren, people are used to building a stone garden, stone on top of stone, and everyone knows that if you use the wrong stone at the bottom, the whole stone garden collapses. If no one wants to take on such assignments, it will not be built either. Stangeland Maskin is now putting everything into destroying a small local community and must now also pay the price for it with a cynical and rotten reputation and legacy.
Han Trygve mostly stayed within the county boundaries...
In the book "På Min Måte" Trygve Stangeland says the following about expansion and "elephant disease":
Thoughts on expansion
One strategy is that there will always be assignments if one is only willing to expand the geographical area of operations sufficiently. Such thinking can easily lead to "elephant disease", which is risky and in this context can be compared to playing "Russian roulette".
TS Maskin itself largely stays within the county boundaries, and was neither involved in the development of Gardermoen airport nor the Olympics in Lillehammer. "In places like this, contractors from all over the country flock together, and push the prices for each other.
"By staying within a relatively small and limited area, a large market share is achieved and a better utilization of equipment and people. Synergy effect," says Trygve, and we experience one of those cases where he resorts to foreign words.
With his son Olav at the helm, this strategy has clearly been completely thrown overboard, shoveled down and buried. Is it "elephant disease" that is now prevailing in Stangeland Maskin...?
Reputation and lack of pride
That you build your reputation on the jobs you choose to take is an undisputed fact. Stangeland Maskin has now chosen one of the most conflict-filled assignments in the country and has also chosen to push forward in a local community with power.
To illustrate this, it is enough to refer to another large Jær company that profiles itself with "Pride in every move". Olav Stangeland, on the other hand, seems to lack pride in what his company is now doing on Haramsøya and with the local community there. In any case, he cannot bear to see a banner with a message from Haramsøya. You can only be happy, the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency has more in store...
Having backbone…
That it is permissible to refuse such assignments was clearly demonstrated in Flekkefjord recently, where a quay owner refused to take turbine parts ashore.
- We are against this development and have given clear notice to Norsk Vind that it is not appropriate to use our quay, says managing director Peder Andersen at Andersen Mek. Workshop (AMV) in Flekkefjord.
NRK - Quay owner refuses to accept wind turbines - hopes to stop development
Having balls and backbone is clearly something that the Stangeland group completely lacks, but a small quay owner in Flekkefjord can afford to say no. How poor are the billion-dollar group Stangelend when they now just HAVE to take on this assignment for a few million?
And this is how the company builds its reputation...
The Norwegian Environmental Protection Association has only just begun to hold the company responsible for the destruction. Expect much more…
An unpleasant reputation
That the billionaire director and owner of the Stangeland group has things to hide in the company quickly became clear when, later in the evening, he placed the Stangeland veterans' bus on the field in front of the banner.
It doesn't help to cover up and hide, it only gets worse...
For those who have covered up something unpleasant or that needs to be hidden know that it doesn't help. Quite the contrary, because now what is prioritized will also be associated with what one tries to hide, and every time one now sees the TS veterans' bus one will think of Haramsøya and the market disaster it is for the company. This is the bus the TS veterans use for all functions and trips, and now it is this bus that Olav Stangeland uses to hide the truth about the company's activities on Haramsøya. The TS veterans' bus has now become a symbol of an executive director and owner who cannot bear to see the truth outside his living room window, and who sees it as much more important to hide the secret than to do something about the problem itself. That he thus chooses to use the company's old and faithful veterans to hide what he personally cannot bear to see says more about his character and personality than anything else. Good luck Olav, now it's time to take your loss like a man, pack up your business on Haramsøya and ship your gear south while you still have some honor left. It only gets worse after this…
The Streisand effect, when hiding something brings increased attention
Most people have heard of Barbara Streisand, and are often familiar with the phenomenon where hiding or covering something up creates increased attention to what one is trying to keep hidden. This is often called the Streisand effect. After Barbara Streisand tried to go to court to prevent people from seeing her giant villa in the most fashionable part of California, this instead became the big talking point where everyone just had to see this picture. The whole thing thus had a completely opposite effect, where it was the censorship attempt in itself that led to close to half a million people seeing the picture in the next few weeks when the whole thing would have been passed over in silence if there hadn't been so much fuss about the picture. History is full of such examples, and Stangeland Maskin are now themselves in the process of achieving it together by hiding a banner that shows the truth about their conflict-filled project on Haramsøya.
And it will get worse…
Getting stuck on Haramsøya is going to be a reputational quagmire that will hang with the company forever. You clearly show that you are willing to almost "walk over corpses" to earn a few extra millions. One would have thought the company and its owner were penniless for not being able to say a clear no. The truth is that the Stangeland group is among the country's largest and richest. Perhaps it is this arrogance that has blinded them and led them into this? Norway's Environmental Protection Association has gone after several major environmental criminal companies before, and also does not back down from a greedy and cynical machine contractor like Stangeland. Haramsøya must be saved, and Stangeland must take his responsibility and get away and leave the local community on beautiful Haramsøya alone.
The Norwegian Environmental Protection Association will not stop holding Stangeland Maskin or other actors and suppliers accountable when they enter into such conflict-ridden and destructive projects as the one on Haramsøya.
The head of the Norwegian Environmental Protection Association, Kurt Oddekalv, was recently at the Stangeland Group's head office to confront owner and CEO Olav Stangeland about the destruction on Haramsøya, but he was not present…
Owner and CEO Olav Stangeland was also nowhere to be found at the TS Museum. Although the workers were outside, we encountered a closed door…
Not even at his own home, we found anyone. Where is Olav..?
Also, don't forget that Kurt Oddekalv called Olav Stangeland personally last year and promised hell if they entered Haramsøya. And if there's one thing Kurt Oddekalv is known for, it's keeping his word. This will be hell for the Stangeland group...
And, dear Olav Stangeland. If you think it helps to place a bus in front of the banner that is hung just outside your living room window, then you don't know the Norwegian Environmental Association. If you don't pull yourself out of Haramsøya neatly and gracefully, your reputation will be much worse after this. Much, much worse. This is a battle you cannot win. And if you continue, you will drag your company down into a reputational disaster.
For Haramsøya, and its inhabitants, yes it is worth taking care of.
From here on it only gets worse...
Reputationally much worse. Take the tape and get out NOW, Stangeland..!!!
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