EKO-Energi—a public voluntary programme: targeted at Swedish firms with ambitious environmental goals

A total of 47 firms joined the Swedish EKO-Energi programme between 1994 and 1997. This was a public voluntary programme devoted to promoting the environmental vanguard, while disregarding the rearguard. The programme offered free energy audits and the promotion of a label, in return for implementation of energy management. Audits covered some 5% of industrial energy consumption. The most clearly observed results were the inclusion of energy efficiency in the environmental policy of participating firms, the dissemination of values and diffusion of pre-existing knowledge within firms, and some added impact of such values and knowledge on decisions. The effects of the EKO-Energi contracts could not be disentangled from the effects of simultaneous ISO 14001 or EMAS certification.