Thamshavn or Thamshamn is a small port village in the municipality of Orkland in

Trøndelag Trøndelag (; sma, Trööndelage) is a county in the central part of Norway. It was created in 1687, then named Trondhjem County ( no, Trondhjems Amt); in 1804 the county was split into Nord-Trøndelag and Sør-Trøndelag by the King of Denmar ...

county,

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and t ...

. It is the site of the

port A port is a maritime facility comprising one or more wharves or loading areas, where ships load and discharge cargo and passengers. Although usually situated on a sea coast or estuary, ports can also be found far inland, such as Ham ...

for the town of Orkanger and the ferrosilicon plant

Elkem Thamshavn Elkem Thamshavn is a smelting plant owned by Elkem located at Thamshavn just north of Orkanger in Orkland Municipality in Trøndelag county, Norway. The plant produces silicon and microsilica and was started in 1931. History Copper and Sulfur have ...

. It is located right along

European route E39 European route E39 is the designation of a north–south road in Norway and Denmark from Klett, just south of Trondheim, to Aalborg via Bergen, Stavanger and Kristiansand. In total, there are nine ferries, more than any other single road in Eu ...

and is the

Thamshavn Station Thamshavn Station ( no, Thamshavn stasjon) is a former railway station on the Thamshavn Line, located at Thamshavn, a port area just northeast of the town of Orkanger in the municipality of Orkland in Trøndelag county, Norway. It is located along ...

was the terminus of the

Thamshavnbanen , logo = , logo_width = , logo_alt = , image_name = Bårdshaug stasjon.jpeg , image_width = , image_alt = , caption = Passenger train at Bårdshaug Station in 191 ...

railway.

History

Thamshavn came into being in 1867 when the local farmer

Wilhelm Thams Wilhelm August Thams (June 22, 1812 – July 4, 1884) was a Norwegian merchant, land owner and lumber mill owner. Biography Wilhelm Thams was the son of Jacob Thullin Thams (1770–1826), who was a bailiff in Ringerike. He was married to Ida Olava ...

established a

sawmill A sawmill (saw mill, saw-mill) or lumber mill is a facility where logs are cut into lumber. Modern sawmills use a motorized saw to cut logs lengthwise to make long pieces, and crosswise to length depending on standard or custom sizes (dimensi ...

on the area that was named after him. He and his son

Christian Thams Christian Thams (9 September 1867 – 22 May 1948) was a Norwegian architect, industrialist, businessman and diplomat. Thams was also a founder and major shareholder of Société du Madal, a Norwegian company which operated coconut oil plantations ...

bought the Løkken Mine at Løkken Verk in 1904 and decided to build a railway from the

mine Mine, mines, miners or mining may refer to: Extraction or digging * Miner, a person engaged in mining or digging *Mining, extraction of mineral resources from the ground through a mine Grammar *Mine, a first-person English possessive pronoun ...

to Thamshavn where they could ship out the

pyrites The mineral pyrite (), or iron pyrite, also known as fool's gold, is an iron sulfide with the chemical formula Fe S2 (iron (II) disulfide). Pyrite is the most abundant sulfide mineral. Pyrite's metallic luster and pale brass-yellow hue giv ...

to continental

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia ...

. At the same time the steam ship D/S ''Orkla'' started operating between Thamshavn and

Trondheim Trondheim ( , , ; sma, Tråante), historically Kaupangen, Nidaros and Trondhjem (), is a city and municipality in Trøndelag county, Norway. As of 2020, it had a population of 205,332, was the third most populous municipality in Norway, and ...

. In 1931,

Orkla Metall Elkem Thamshavn is a smelting plant owned by Elkem located at Thamshavn just north of Orkanger in Orkland Municipality in Trøndelag county, Norway. The plant produces silicon and microsilica and was started in 1931. History Copper and Sulfur ha ...

(now Elkem Thamshavn) was established by the Orkla Mining Company to smelt the pyrites to

sulfur Sulfur (or sulphur in British English) is a chemical element with the symbol S and atomic number 16. It is abundant, multivalent and nonmetallic. Under normal conditions, sulfur atoms form cyclic octatomic molecules with a chemical formula ...

and

copper Copper is a chemical element with the symbol Cu (from la, cuprum) and atomic number 29. It is a soft, malleable, and ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity. A freshly exposed surface of pure copper has a pinkis ...

. During

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, Thamshavn was one of the targets for the

Thamshavnbanen sabotage The Thamshavn Line sabotage was a series of sabotages against the railway Thamshavn Line in Orkdal, Norway during World War II. There were four separate sabotages, all performed by Norwegian Independent Company 1, Company Linge in an attempt by the ...

. Today the mine is abandoned and the railway has been converted to a

heritage railway A heritage railway or heritage railroad (US usage) is a railway operated as living history to re-create or preserve railway scenes of the past. Heritage railways are often old railway lines preserved in a state depicting a period (or periods) i ...

, but the smelter and port still live on.

Today

Thamshavn still has a working smelting plant that is owned by

Elkem Elkem is a company that produces silicones, silicon, alloys for the foundry industry, carbon and microsilica, and other materials. Elkem was founded in 1904, has more than 7,000 employees and fields 30 production sites worldwide. Elkem has an oper ...

. The smelting plant employs about 130 people on a daily basis, producing some of the finest

silicon Silicon is a chemical element with the symbol Si and atomic number 14. It is a hard, brittle crystalline solid with a blue-grey metallic luster, and is a tetravalent metalloid and semiconductor. It is a member of group 14 in the periodic tab ...

there is in the world. Elkem Thamshavn is also famous for its energy renewal program—one of the first of its kind in the world to use this technology. Today, Elkem Thamshavn reuses 20-25% of all energy used.

References

{{authority control Villages in Trøndelag Orkland Orkla ASA