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energy has grown substantially during the last couple of decades. Two major challenges of renewable energy strategies for sustainable development can be identified. One challenge is to integrate a high share of intermittent resources into the energy system, especially the electricity supply [19,20]. The other is to include the transportation sector in the strategies [21,22]. Based on the case of Denmark, this paper describes the challenges and discusses the potential solutions to these challenges.
In Denmark, savings and efficiency improvements have been important parts of the energy policy since the first oil crisis in 1973. Hence, by means of energy conservation and expansion of Combined Heat and Power production (CHP) and district heating, Denmark has been able to maintain the same primary fuel consumption for a period of more than 30 years in spite of about 70% increase in GDP. Moreover, 14% of fossil fuels have been replaced by renewable energy. In the same period, both transportation and electricity consumption as well as the heated space area have increased substantially.
Thus, Denmark is an example of how sustainable development strategies constituted by a combination of savings, efficiency improvements and renewables can be implemented. Consequently, Denmark is now facing the
0360-5442/$ - see front matter r 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.energy.2006.10.017