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Topic Centres

Topic Centres

The Department of Ecoscience provides independent, research-based consultancy to authorities and businesses through DCE - Danish Centre For Environment And Energy. The foundation for our advice is internationally recognised research within nature and the environment.

We provice consultancy nationally, internationally and in collaboration with private companies. Through our consultancy to authorities, we provide a professional and scientific basis for political decisions on nature and the environment. This is done, among other things, through AU's framework agreement with the Ministry of Environment and Food and through our work for the Government of Greenland.

The Department of Ecoscience is also, through DCE, an important partner for the Ministry of Environment and Food when it comes to monitoring nature and the marine environment in Denmark. Four specialist data centres are located at the department and help ensure that Denmark complies with its legal obligations.

The Danish Ministry of Environment and Food has a number of topic centres under the nationwide monitoring programme on the aquatic environment and nature (NOVANA) of which four are run by the Department of Ecoscience that also undertakes part of the NOVANA monitoring activities.

Tasks of the topic centres

The topic centres ensure the collection, storage and quality assurance of monitoring data at a national level. The collected and stored data must be available at all times for all the parties involved in the  monitoring for use in national and international reports.

The topic centres carry out the following tasks under NOVANA:

  • Prepare technical specifications for sampling and storing data
  • Are responsible for nationwide data storage, quality assurance of data and data processing
  • Prepare nationwide scientific reports on various sub-topics
  • Organise intercalibration of sampling procedures and field methods
  • Collaborate with the Danish Nature Agency’s scientific coordination groups.