Turning pollution into fuel [Blueprints for a Miracle]

JUST OFF A TWO-LANE highway that winds through the black volcanic rock fields of southwest Iceland sits a nondescript industrial plant. Its multistoried network of pipes and tubes reveal little about what goes on there. Each year hundreds of thousands of tourists pass right by, on their way to visit the strange and beautiful Blue Lagoon, an outdoor spa whose steaming milky blue water flows directly from the nearby Svartsengi geothermal power station. If tourists notice the plant at all, it's maybe to wonder why it's here.