COWI contributes to shaping vision for one of the largest indus-trial areas in Northern Europe

07.01.2019

Today, the Danish Government and Hvidovre Municipality are launching one of the greenest and most innovative industrial areas in Northern Europe: Holmene. COWI contributes to shaping the vision for this large-scale urban de-velopment project.

Holmene is expected to hold 380 new companies and 12,000 jobs and to gen-erate new growth – as much as DKK 54 billion. And with its 700,000 m² of na-ture near urban areas, high biodiversity and a new 17-kilometre coast-line, Holmene will also act as the Danish capital’s new recreational area.

Built on surplus soil

Holmene is an extension of the existing industrial area Avedøre Holme. Ulf Kjellerup, Chief Market Manager of COWI’s unit for Water and Environment, explains the physical realisation of the area:

"Each year, construction projects in the capital area generate an average of three million tonnes of surplus soil, which is hard to dispose of. Joining forces with Hvidovre Municipality, we looked into how to use this soil as a resource to create value by extending and developing an innovative industrial area.”

The huge urban development project is part of the Danish Government’s mas-terplan for tomorrow’s Copenhagen. In October 2018, the Government pre-sented Lynetteholmen – a new residential area on a manmade island which will also be constructed using surplus soil.

In the next 29 years, 87 million tonnes of soil will be used to construct the two new urban development projects. The first step for Holmene is to prepare an EIA statement, and land reclamation is expected to start in 2022.

New facility reaping massive CO₂ savings

Holmene will also be home to Green Tech Island: A high-tech facility that will take over Lynetten – Copenhagen’s major wastewater treatment facility – and provide green processing and reuse of wastewater from the entire capital. Green Tech Island is expected to be able to supply 140,000 citizens with green energy and cut CO₂ emissions by 74,000 tonnes a year.

Read more about the Holmene project here: http://www.holmene.com/