Norway¡¯s blustery Fosen Peninsula is a long way from anywhere, its mountains sustaining the Indigenous Sami and their reindeer for centuries. These same peaks are vital to the kingdom¡¯s wind energy plans, and native herder Lena Haugen says her people pay the price.
Snaking through the snowy terrain are dozens of sky-high wind turbines, built on Sami land by state-controlled Fosen Vind. When the machines came, the reindeer left, spooked by the cacophony of construction and the whoosh of spinning blades.
For the Sami, that migration threatened a core part of their culture and subsistence economy. So they pushed back, and last year the nation¡¯s highest court sided with them, ruling that 151 turbines in traditional grazing patches violate the Samis¡¯ human rights under international law.
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