By Karl H. Ystanes

After leading Statkraft’s summer project in Høyanger in 2003, completing her thesis for Statkraft in Madrid and celebrating her graduation from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) with a Master’s degree in engineering in the summer of 2004, Ingeborg Dårflot decided to stay in the power business. Last autumn she became one of three Statkraft trainees, and now has the opportunity to really get to know Norway’s power plants. The trainee programme launches her on a two-year voyage of discovery spanning two major power plants and several departments at head office in Oslo.

This autumn she has been stationed at the Nore power plant in Rødberg, Numedal, around 100 km north of Kongsberg. The young engineer certainly has no complaints about the accommodation. She has the entire “mess” to herself, an elegant building with nine bathrooms and eight bedrooms, a cosy den, a drawing room with rococo furniture, and a fridge you can get lost in. In the evenings she can gaze out at the sunset over Rødberg and look down at the old power plant from 1927. Since Rødberg is not the centre of the universe, there is plenty of time to curl up with a good book of an evening. But she enjoys the work enormously, particularly since no two days are ever the same.

Including Ingeborg
“It is a great job. It is challenging, diverse and I am learning a huge amount about how a power plant is operated, and not least, what it is like for the lads on the ‘shopfloor’, and what facilities like this mean to the local communities in which they are situated.”

And what is it like for the lads on the shopfloor?
“Ha-ha-ha, they are doing very nicely, thank you! A colleague once told me he thought it was very nice that I enjoyed spending time with older men. Ha-ha, wasn’t that a good joke? Actually, I have been very well received. The tone can be a bit rough and macho from time to time, with a ratio of three women to 27 men, but we get along just fine. You have to be open-minded, and the atmosphere here is very inclusive. The most important thing is that for the career I have chosen this period is crucial for an understanding of the many aspects of power production in Norway. Statkraft primarily generates electricity, and it is out here in rural areas that they do it. This is Statkraft’s heart, and I naturally want to learn as much as possible about it. It will give me good ballast for the future. This six-month period will keep me going for a long time,” says Ingeborg.

Do the others consider you a colleague or an apprentice?
“A colleague, definitely. But the whole idea of traineeships is perhaps a bit of a novelty for many people. It is possible that the status of a trainee is not as well known at all the different facilities. I was also a bit worried that it could be difficult to win acceptance, or that I would be perceived as being a greenhorn sent by head office to bother them. But that has certainly not been the case. I have been taken seriously from day one. And in October I was invited to go elk hunting, which I take as a sign that I am accepted as one of the lads,” says Ingeborg.

300 km by snowmobile 
Dam watchman Magne Pladsen pops in and confirms what Ingeborg has just said. “Yes, I have to say it is really great working with Ingeborg. I think it is good for youngsters like her to find out a bit more about what it is like out in the field,” says Pladsen.

He has arrived to give his final instructions for the next few days. At the Nore power plant in Rødberg, the trainee’s days are organised to enable her to get to know the entire plant as well as possible. That means doing everything from inspecting maintenance work, conducting HSE activities, restocking mountain lakes with fish, prioritising tasks, cost accounting, discussions with the local authority, measuring the depth of the snow, and long trips into the mountains. The day after we met Ingeborg, she set off with Pladsen on a 300-km-long journey by snowmobile to adjust a hatch in the Halne Dam. 

“The privilege of being a trainee is that you get to see lots of different parts of the company, and you can decide which department you would like to concentrate on as time goes by,” explains Ingeborg, as we stroll along by the impressive power plant.

You were leader of Statkraft’s summer project in 2003. What influence did that have on your choice of career?
“It was a unique opportunity to get to know a large company from the inside. The project we were working on in 2003 was also motivating, not least because it tied together what we were learning at university with the real world of work. We saw the relevance of it, and we saw how the different disciplines are dependent on one another when you are working on a project of that kind.”

So you can recommend a summer at Statkraft?
“Yes, definitely. It was a fantastic experience!”
Ingeborg Dårflot’s trainee period lasts for two years. She will be stationed at Nore until February. Then she heads off for another six months at the headquarters for Region Eastern Norway in Dalen, Telemark. After that she will move to Statkraft’s head office in Oslo, where she will work in the technical department and finally the construction department.