Albertslund (population: 30,000), a municipality in greater Copenhagen, Denmark.

A ‘User Group’ representing the interests of local consumers of heat and power, and which later included water, sewers and waste management; the Municipality of Albertslund; the State Green Fund; local housing co-operative societies; local utilities (i.e. water, the combined incinerator/ heat and power generator); the Local Culture-Ecological School, and the Danish Technical University.

The Agenda center evolved from a user group established in the 1980’s to ensure the influence of local residents on the price setting of heat and power to local housing areas. It later expanded its involvement to include water distribution, sewers, and waste management. In 1994, together with the partners named above, the user group linked in to local Agenda 21 activities to create funding, staff and premises for the Agenda Center.

The primary aim of the Agenda Center is ‘to work for change of environmental behavior and promote a sustainable way of living’. It does this by developing local Agenda 21 plans that start a positive cycle of setting up goals, identifying projects, implementing them and then measuring the achievements. As capacity is developed by all partners, more ambitious goals and projects are undertaken, which matured into the development of neighborhood based action plans for the reduction of water consumption, energy conservation, increasing biodiversity etc. End of year results are published in what is known as the ‘Green Account’ and circulated to residents to show performance and progress. Residents have become more aware of their own area’s consumption as well as that of neighboring areas. They are able to set informed goals about future consumption levels, including an element of friendly competition between housing areas.

The Agenda Center acts as a ‘go-between’ for the local authority, residents and utilities, helping to catalyze and inspire citizens. It is part of a developing network of local environmental public information and participation systems, which now exists in Denmark.

The Center is financed by the user group, which receives income from a minor local tax on heating and electricity, the Green Fund, and the Municipality of Albertslund.

Consumption and production patterns, capacity building, land resource management

• Annual publication of a ‘Green Account’ for each housing area with figures for local consumption of water, electricity, heat and other measures. The figures show a decline or stagnation of usage for consumption. The Manager of the Agenda Center states that ‘it is important to notice that the most significant contribution of the Center to more sustainable development is not the consumption reductions themselves, but in starting of a new process’.

• Built organizational capacity in the community, through new, innovative, co-operative relationships between communities, local government and service providers. An example of this is the direct revenue income, which is accrued to the Agenda Center through the provision of a local tax.

• Prepared 15 Local Agenda 21 Plans covering about 13,000 people, or 45 percent of the inhabitants in Albertslund.

• The Danish Technical University is evaluating the results of the project.

• Four factors converge in attempting to summarize the key lesson arising from the Agenda Center: i) Partnership, between the main suppliers of ‘public utilities’ to the communities, the local authority and the representatives of the housing areas; ii) Accountability, that the utilities are responsible to their customers and have re-oriented their services to respond to their needs; iii) Transparency, the clarity of information which is produced and disseminated to residents illustrating the consumption ‘performance’ of neighboring areas; iv) Attitudes to environment and consumption are effecting behavior, not just at individual and community level, but also have the power to drive change among local institutions.

• Multiplying effect of the work Center enabling the inhabitants look at what other housing districts are doing and look at what they themselves are accomplishing – made possible by the publication of the ‘Green Account’ for each residential district.

• The most important economic instrument to promote the initiative is considered to be the small local tax on heat, waste handling and water consumption.