In Denmark there is an ongoing public debate in the media and elsewhere on the
anthropogenic greenhouse effect, its extent, and the political reaction in the form of
policies and measures. In 2002 the government published its strategy for sustainable
development. The Danish climate policy must be seen in the light of the action to make the
development of Danish society sustainable. The strategy includes involvement of the public
and transparency concerning the basis for decisions and analyses. Denmark has a long
tradition for involving the public, and in the environmental area this was followed up
with an international agreement - the Århus Convention from 1998. In the international UN
negotiations on a common effort to mitigate the effect of climate changes, both Danish
industry, and green and developmentoriented organisations were represented in the Danish
delegation. The websites of the Ministry of Environment (http://www.mim.dk/),
the Danish Environmental Protection Agency (www.mst.dk),
the Ministry of Finance (www.fm.dk), the Ministry of Economic and Business Affairs
(www.oem.dk) and the Danish Energy Authority (www.ens.dk) provide considerable information
about climate change and Denmark's policy in this area.
The Danish Environmental Protection Agency has also initiated mapping of information
obligations and activities in the climate area. The main purpose of the mapping project is
to contribute to a basis for decisions on future information activities in the climate
area on the basis of Denmark's formal commitments, the initiatives of Denmark and others,
and general activities up to the present time.
Climate change is a central theme at Copenhagen Global Change Initiative (COGCI), which
is a PhD school and research network established in cooperation between the University of
Copenhagen, the DMI, NERI, and GEUS. The school has 25 PhD students registered at present.
The programme comprises general and specialist courses, together with seminars and theme
days. Seminars and theme days are open to the public, and plans are in hand to offer the
courses to other institutes and the business community as supplementary training.
The universities disseminate widely the result of research - for example, the Niels
Bohr Institute's activities are published at the website
http://www.fys.ku.dk/hco/presse/For midling2002.htm. A large part of this work concerns
climate, both specifically and more generally.
The DMI arranges lectures for, for example, upper secondary school pupils, teachers,
researchers, and other interested persons. In addition, employees from a number of
institutions participated in the Danish Natural Science Festival in 1998 and 2000, holding
lectures around the country.
For upper secondary school pupils and pupils taking the higher preparatory examination,
the Ministry of Environment, together with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has prepared
material for teaching about the environment. This project, which is called "The
Global Environment" has climate as one of its main themes. The material is
Internet-based (www.globalemiljoe.dk) and is supplemented by a textbook.
In connection with the many projects initiated under the Danish Environmental
Protection Agency's (DEPA) Programme for Cleaner Products, reports are required, and these
are made publicly accessible. In addition, articles are prepared for various technical
journals so that the relevant target groups learn about the results.
The DEPA website is regularly updated with the latest relevant information within the
climate area, either directly in the form of press releases, documents, reports, etc. or
through links to the actual players.
NERI has prepared a number of reports. Technical Report No. 401 contains an evaluation
of Denmark's need and possibilities for adapting to future climate changes. The report
features on NERI's website www.dmu.dk. A number of NERI's reports on climate are also
designed for use in the education sector, including Theme Report 29/1999 "Where does
air pollution come from?" and Theme Report 31/2000 "CO2, where, why,
how much?".
The DMI's website, http://www.dmi.dk/, provides current and historical climate data,
together with a thorough description of the climate system and climate processes and
themes on new results from the international scientific literature. The DMI also
communicates through lectures and popular articles in newspapers and trade journals,
through books and series of reports, and at theme days and in the magazine KlimaNyt
(Climate News), which is published electronically two to four times a year. In 2001 the
DMI published the book "Climate Change Research - Danish Contributions", edited
in cooperation with Risø National Laboratory and NERI. The book provides a general
introduction to the problem of man-made climate changes and describes research projects
and results at a number of institutions in Denmark. The reports, KlimaNyt and the climate
book can be obtained at www.dmi.dk. IPCC's results in the "Third Assessment
Report" (TAR) in Danish have been disseminated in part through publication of a book,
"Global Warming - Mitigation and Adaptation". Another website of interest is
http://www.glaciology.gfy.ku.dk/, which is regularly updated.
The DMI participates in a number of international projects with support primarily from
the European Commission's framework research programmes. In addition, the Institute
contributes to the IPCC's work. Partly in cooperation with the Max Planck Institut für
Meteorologie in Hamburg, the DMI has carried out analyses of the development of climate
for two of the IPCC's SRES emission scenarios with a coupled atmosphere ocean model
system.
These scenarios are available for effect studies in the IPCC's scenario database.
Employees at the DMI have also participated in the preparation of the IPCC's Third
Assessment Report (TAR) - one was coordinating author, another contributing author and
several participated as expert reviewers.
The Danish Institute of Agricultural Sciences has contributed to the IPCC through an EU
Concerted Action concerning effects of climate changes and adaptation to a changed climate
in Europe.
Risø National Laboratory also participates at expert level in the IPCC. The UNEP
Centre at Risø has contributed to the TAR WG III Report with five authors and a
coordinating author. The UNEP Centre participates in a wide range of information
activities in that connection with different policy possibilities in cooperation with the
DMI, NERI, and others. NERI works in different ways to popularise and communicate the
content of TAR, the latest research results on climate effects, etc.
Campaigns
A number of initiatives are being carried out for companies and private households with
a view to promoting environmentally sound behaviour, particularly for climate reasons and
in relation to energy use. Denmark uses labelling schemes, printed material, information
lines and media spots to increase public knowledge of possibilities for action and least
environmentally harmful technology.
In the last few years environment policy has increasingly focused on the fact that we
all share responsibility for environmental problems and for helping to solve them. This
strategy is now also penetrating in the transport sector, and in the last three to four
years, two large nationwide environmental traffic campaigns have been implemented."We
cycle to work" and "Environmental Traffic Week", which is an element in the
European car-free day on 22 September and European Mobility Week, in which more than 1,000
towns all over Europe participated in 2002. In "We cycle to work" the Danish
Cyclists' Federation has established good cooperation with many citizens and companies and
has particularly communicated the health benefits of cycling as a form of transport. In
"Environmental Traffic Week" the emphasis was on demonstrating more
environmentfriendly transport habits (use the car less, buy an energy-efficient car, drive
together with others, use the bike for short trips, use public transport as much as
possible, etc.). Emphasis was also on discussing traffic habits with the public in open
dialogue and without reproach. In this way greater public engagement in the cause of
environmental traffic can be established and help to create greater understanding of new
ways of organising urban transport systems.
Another reason for the increased campaign and information activities is that a
combination of measures affecting attitudes and behaviour and other forms of
encouragement, such as economy and accessibility without a car are needed to promote more
environment-friendly traffic habits.
Evaluations1 show that both
"We cycle to work" and the "Environmental Traffic Week" have had a
good effect and have been well received by municipalities, interest and grassroots
organisations, and companies, all of which were in charge of most of the actual
activities. The Ministry of Transport and the Ministry of the Environment have so far
provided funding of DKK 4-5 million for Environmental Traffic Week each year in order to
support and co-fund the work of the municipalities. The present government co-funding ends
in 2003, after which it will be up to the Danish municipalities themselves to finance any
participation in European Mobility Week.
In the years ahead the growing public focus on lifestyle diseases and obesity will
probably provide good opportunities for marketing nonmotorised forms of transport, such as
cycling and walking, in public health campaigns drawing people’s attention to the
health benefits of using a bike more often, walking to the shops, leisure activities, etc.