Solar expert Hemsol has released a study naming Norway as the greenest country in Europe – with the UK failing to make the top ten.
The study used data from the European Environment Agency, the Odyssee-Mure Project and the Energy Institute to create an index with factors such as renewable energy share, recycling rates, carbon dioxide emissions and more, to find out which European country can be considered the greenest and most environmentally friendly.
Norway gained the top spot thanks to its high renewable energy share recorded in 2022, followed by Austria, which registered the highest share of passenger traffic on public transport in Europe.
The United Kingdom came in at 17th (in a list of 31 countries) scoring 44.5 out of 100.
To achieve the results, the most recent data was gathered on: the percentage of renewable energy share, the municipal waste recycling rates, the percentage of public transport share in total passenger traffic, the woodland and farmland area and the carbon dioxide emissions per capita of each state.
Each factor was then transformed into a score from 0 to 10 to standardise the results and each was assigned a weighting by which the original scores were multiplied, as factors such as renewable energy share and carbon dioxide emission have a higher influence on how ‘green’ a country can be considered.
The values are the following:
- Renewable energy share: 3
- Municipal waste recycling rate: 2
- Public transport share: 2
- Woodland: 1
- Farmland: 1
- Carbon dioxide emissions: 3
The values were then summed to finally achieve a score out of 100.
Full table indexed:
| Rank | Country | Renewable energy share 2022 | Municipal waste recycling rates 2021 | Share of public transport in total passenger traffic 2021 | Woodland area | Farmland | Carbon dioxide emissions per capita | Score/100 |
| 1 | Norway | 8,33 | 4,76 | N/A | 4,5 | 10 | 8,09 | 73,3 |
| 2 | Austria | 3,34 | 9,06 | 10 | 6,39 | 5,2 | 7,65 | 68,89 |
| 3 | Finland | 4,14 | 4,9 | 3,97 | 10 | 9,23 | 8,47 | 62,31 |
| 4 | Iceland | 10 | 2,68 | N/A | 0 | 7,42 | 6,46 | 62,13 |
| 5 | Sweden | 6,96 | 4,99 | 5,5 | 9,42 | 9,23 | 4,65 | 62,05 |
| 6 | Estonia | 3,35 | 3,36 | 2,96 | 7 | 6,7 | 9,73 | 54,66 |
| 7 | Germany | 0,98 | 10 | 3,23 | 4,43 | 2,73 | 8,64 | 52,06 |
| 8 | Luxembourg | 0,31 | 7,79 | 4,55 | 4,84 | 1,75 | 10 | 51,83 |
| 9 | Switzerland | N/A | 7,43 | N/A | 4,31 | 4,23 | 4,27 | 51,75 |
| 10 | Slovenia | 1,52 | 8,76 | 2,43 | 8,47 | 5,48 | 7,02 | 51,63 |
| 11 | Czechia | 0,65 | 5,66 | 6,72 | 4,69 | 3,13 | 9,04 | 51,39 |
| 12 | Slovakia | 0,61 | 6,65 | 5,98 | 5,49 | 4,09 | 7 | 48,09 |
| 13 | Belgium | 0 | 7,82 | 5,13 | 3,04 | 3,22 | 8,49 | 48,03 |
| 14 | Denmark | 3,18 | 8,19 | 4,39 | 1,96 | 0,41 | 6,43 | 46,97 |
| 15 | Italy | 0,72 | 7,19 | 6,24 | 4,31 | 3,44 | 6,5 | 46,88 |
| 16 | Latvia | 4,25 | 5,81 | 3,76 | 7,37 | 5,41 | 3,81 | 46,74 |
| 17 | United Kingdom | 3,63 | 5,89 | N/A | 1,73 | 0,00 | 6,72 | 44,56 |
| 18 | Poland | 0,36 | 5,13 | 4,92 | 4,18 | 2,84 | 8,32 | 44,34 |
| 19 | The Netherlands | 0,21 | 8,23 | 2,59 | 1,47 | 1,82 | 9,04 | 43,88 |
| 20 | Croatia | 2,5 | 3,56 | 3,76 | 4,66 | 5,97 | 5,34 | 40,65 |
| 21 | Hungary | 0,12 | 4,18 | 8,94 | 3,09 | 1 | 5,58 | 39,54 |
| 22 | Spain | 1,14 | 4,5 | 4,76 | 5,02 | 1,93 | 6,14 | 39,42 |
| 23 | France | 0,93 | 5,75 | 5,08 | 4,23 | 1,95 | 5,23 | 38,6 |
| 24 | Ireland | 0,06 | 5,22 | 4,81 | 1,45 | 0 | 8,03 | 38,18 |
| 25 | Portugal | 2,99 | 3,38 | 2,06 | 4,7 | 4,06 | 5,57 | 37,79 |
| 26 | Greece | 1,63 | 1,72 | 4,44 | 4,29 | 2,74 | 6,95 | 37,59 |
| 27 | Bulgaria | 0,75 | 2,99 | 3,33 | 4,8 | 2,96 | 7,4 | 37,39 |
| 28 | Lithuania | 2,19 | 5,84 | 0 | 4,73 | 2,81 | 5,4 | 35 |
| 29 | Cyprus | 0,71 | 0,71 | 3,86 | 2,5 | 8,47 | 6,33 | 34,37 |
| 30 | Romania | 1,24 | 0 | 7,72 | 4,08 | 0,93 | 3,66 | 29,32 |
| 31 | Malta | 0,09 | 0,41 | 4,6 | 0,08 | 5,19 | 0 | 12,96 |
