The EU commissioner for energy appears to have no shortage of the stuff.
At the COP26 UN climate summit in 2021, the centre-left politician was caught sneaking in a round of push-ups — which, a former aide said, was a way for him to recharge between negotiating rounds.
Peers describe Dan Jørgensen as a hard-working and pragmatic figure, able to labour around the clock to get things done.
That might be just the right approach for the huge task ahead of him: since December, he’s been charged with seeing one of Europe’s most polluting sectors through a highly consequential transition — all without endangering the bloc’s energy supply, tanking its competitiveness or sparking an energy price crisis.
Jørgensen took up his posting in Brussels after a long career in politics, first as an MEP, then in government in his native Denmark. He served as minister in both of Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen’s administrations, before and after a 2022 parliamentary election, holding first the climate and energy portfolio, and subsequently a combined brief for climate and development.
In that capacity, he worked with many of those who’d go on to become his Commission colleagues.
He teamed up with Spain’s Teresa Ribera to champion renewables during their respective stints as energy minister; she is now Commission vice-president for competition and sustainability. At COP28 in Dubai in 2023, he also negotiated with Climate Commissioner Wopke Hoekstra, who’d just been appointed to replace fellow Dutchman Frans Timmermans at the EU executive. Hoekstra has retained the climate brief in Brussels in the new Commission appointed in 2024.
Jørgensen, 50, has authored several books and even tried his hand at podcasting — activities all rooted in a vision of the European Union as an answer to climate change, and other crises besides.
A ‘good guy’ who looks beyond borders
Jørgensen has a master's degree in political science and is no novice on the topics he’s now tackling.
He arrived at the Commission as a familiar Brussels face, having served two terms as an MEP. "He was already interested [in energy and climate] when I met him at the European Parliament, in 2004," said Claude Turmes, a veteran Green MEP who later served as Luxembourg’s energy minister.
As Denmark’s energy and climate minister, Jørgensen negotiated the revision of EU directives on renewable energy and on energy efficiency, RED and EED. This period also coincided with Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, and he negotiated for Copenhagen on EU emergency packages that responded to the resulting energy crisis, such as the REPowerEU plan to reduce EU dependency on Russian energy.
His 2022 move from energy into international development as part of a cabinet reshuffle extended his experience into multilateralism, global diplomacy and international climate negotiations.
During COP28, Jørgensen was one of two co-facilitators appointed by the Emirati presidency to lead political consultations on the Global Stocktake, a checkpoint on climate progress carried out every five years under the 2015 Paris Agreement.
When he took up his post to the Commission, this international experience was viewed as a good indicator that Jørgensen would be able to approach his EU role “with a global vision”, said Jens Mattias Clausen, who advised Jørgensen during his time as a minister in Copenhagen.
Niels Fuglsang, Jørgensen’s former parliamentary assistant who’s now himself an MEP, said that, even as a minister, Jørgensen always “played a more important role than that of a simple representative of Denmark”.
The Social Democrat seems to have left fond memories in his wake — even on the opposite side of Brussels’ political spectrum.
German MEP Peter Liese, of the centre-right European People’s Party (EPP), said he was a “good guy”. Liese — who worked alongside Jørgensen in the EU parliament’s environment and food safety committee — said that, even after he became a minister, Jørgensen “still took the time to come back and talk to MEPs” — even those from rival political camps.
This ability to listen has earned the commissioner as much praise in Brussels as in Copenhagen, helping him build a reputation as a consensus builder with a “well rounded” character, as one diplomat put it.
Among those Contexte spoke to, only one person noted a shadow on this otherwise bright public persona: a tendency to be irritable towards critics.
"He doesn't always react very constructively to criticism," this person said. "When he feels he's being mistreated, he doesn't always have a very thick skin,” they added, in what could explain Jørgensen’s occasionally tense relations with journalists. “But,” they added, “I think he's trying to work on it.”
Red-green
For many around him, the bloc’s energy chief is decidedly part of the modern, green-minded flank of the socialist family.
Jørgensen is known for getting Denmark to adopt one of the world's most ambitious climate targets: to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 70% from 1990 levels by 2030. He is also one of the main architects of the Beyond Oil & Gas Alliance, formed at COP26 by a dozen or so countries to show their commitment to facilitating a gradual phase-out of oil and gas production.
Former adviser Clausen said these achievements can be attributed to Jørgensen’s sense of responsibility and his knack for “sniffing out” political opportunities to deliver on these duties.
Jørgensen’s green tinge hails back to his early school years — one former classmate recounted that he was taught to boil potatoes with a single spoonful of water — and has become well-known in the sector.
For Luxembourg Green Turmes, Jørgensen is a clear representative of "modern socialism".
"He has understood that, beyond redistribution, there is something very important: the plane," said Turmes. As MEPs, Turmes said he and Jørgensen often launched joint initiatives on renewable energy and energy efficiency.
Jørgensen is said to have been greatly inspired by the late Svend Auken, a Social Democrat who pioneered renewable energy in Denmark in the 1990s and who took the younger man under his wing as he debuted in politics. Like Auken, Jørgensen has published several books and essays, mostly about climate and environmental policy and the EU’s role in the world.
During his time as Danish climate minister, he also hosted Planet A, a government podcast in English where he interviewed prominent figures about climate change, including World Bank President Ajay Banga and Hoekstra — with whom he appears to get on well.
Nuclear neutrality?
In the past, Jørgensen has made no secret of his aversion to nuclear power — a fact which raised eyebrows at the time of his appointment.
As national energy minister, Jørgensen had criticised the inclusion of nuclear power in the EU’s green finance taxonomy, which defines the economic activities that can be labelled as environmentally sustainable.
At the time, Jørgensen was one of several EU ministers calling for a “nuclear-free” taxonomy, and, alongside Ribera, was one of six signatories of a letter to the previous Commission pushing for an EU energy mix based on 100% renewables by 2050.
Back then, observers worried about Jørgensen’s ability or willingness to set national interests aside and play the role of an honest EU broker. Since then, the energy price crisis triggered by Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine has turned the tide on nuclear, shifting views in Brussels and national capitals.
A non-discriminatory stance towards nuclear as an energy source remains, in any case, a prerequisite to his role as commissioner.
His mission letter, where Commission President Ursula von der Leyen laid out the major deliverables of his post, instructs him to support and accelerate deployment of key nuclear infrastructure and to “continue ensuring nuclear safety and safeguards”, including diversified supplies and waste management.
This article was first published in French in October 2024.
