Time in Iceland

UTC+00:00 was adopted on 7 April 1968 – in order for Iceland to be in sync with Europe – replacing UTC−01:00, which had been the standard time zone since 16 November 1907.

This changed at the beginning of the 20th century, with the foundation of Iceland's national telephone company, Landssíminn, in 1906, which allowed for near real-time communication.

[3] In 1968, astronomers Traustur Einarsson and Þorsteinn Sæmundsson from the University of Iceland made a proposal to the Althing to abolish daylight saving time and adopt UTC+00:00 year-round.

[4] They argued that the observation of daylight saving time confused the scheduling times of aircraft in international flights, caused unnecessary work as all clocks had to be reset, disrupted people's sleep patterns – especially infants – and in general caused confusion, irritation and extra hassle to Icelanders.

Thus, they proposed observing UTC+00:00 year-round as it would "eliminate all of the above problems, but would still preserve the benefits of summer time", such as being better in sync with Europe – making international trading and telephone calls easier – and allowing for more daylight.

[8][9][10] In November 2017, a work group under the Ministry of Health (which also included Björg) began conducting research into her claims.

[11][12] Public opinion was also in favour of switching to UTC−01:00: in December 2019, a survey conducted by RÚV showed 56 percent of 1,600 respondents supported the proposed change.

[15][16][17] Despite this, Iceland observes UTC+00:00 in order to be in sync with Europe, which results in noon being an hour behind other countries in the same offset, for example 88 minutes behind London.

But, as Iceland does not observe its geographical position offset, this makes sunrise, noon and sunset happen an hour later than human's biological clocks indicate, which Björg argued leads to disturbed sleep cycles, in-turn giving Icelanders – particularly teenagers – social jet lag, leading to sleep deprivation, slowed reaction times, fatigue, difficulty in concentrating and more frequent mood swings.

[8][9][10] In January 2018, a work group under the Ministry of Health (which also included Björg) further echoed these concerns, when after a study they concluded that Iceland's peculiar position on the geographical time zone map had indeed affected Icelander's health, and in particular led to an "increased risk of illness, poorer schooling, increased depression and fatigue.

In 2019, astrophysicist Gunnlaugur Björnsson, while noting the importance of sleep, argued that changing the time zone would not fix sleep deprivation or stop its negative effects, citing "nowhere have I seen research that clock setting affects the progression or recovery of lifestyle diseases and other ailments."