Youris.com
Summary
It began with a national competition in 1997. Denmark, shaken by the 1970s oil crisis and industrial job losses, had been on a mission to go green and transform its economy. Samsø, an island of 4,000 people off the Jutland Peninsula and reliant on coal and oil from the mainland, responded to the call to create a model community of green innovation and technology. “We were struggling with a loss of jobs and an ageing population, too few kids to maintain a good school system, a roaring urbanisation draining all the resources out of rural districts,” says Søren Hermansen, a farmer born and raised on the island. “So, we were fighting to avoid that and we thought, ‘here is maybe an opportunity if we make this transition’… not because we want to save the world but or the climate but more to save ourselves. It was a very pragmatic attitude.”
The island won the competition, and Hermansen has been the driving force behind the transformation that followed. Wind turbine projects were up and running within a few years, followed by district heating, generating heat centrally before distribution to local areas. Today, after investments totalling €57 million, Samsø has 11 onshore and 10 offshore wind turbines, four biomass-fuelled district heating plants, solar panels and electric vehicles. The transition has created jobs and depopulation has been stemmed. The island has effectively become carbon neutral and aims to become completely carbon-free by 2030.
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