Your Majesty, dear colleague and friend. 
Ministers, ladies and gentlemen – good morning.

It is a great pleasure to welcome you to Denmark for the first time in my capacity as head of state.

Two years ago, Queen Mary and I had the pleasure of visiting your beautiful country together with a business delegation, many members of which are here today.

During that visit, we exchanged the latest developments in energy production and consumption. Promising renewable energy solutions and energy-efficient technologies were introduced, and invaluable relationships between our nations were established and strengthened.

Today, we are here to take yet another step towards a greener future.

The Netherlands and Denmark are both renowned for our forward-thinking approaches to climate change. We share the ambition of realizing the North Sea’s potential as a global hub for green energy, and our partnership reached a major milestone with the signing of the Esbjerg Declaration, just a month before our visit in 2022.

Together with Germany and Belgium, we aim to more than double our offshore wind capacity by 2050 and to contribute significantly to the large-scale onshore and offshore production of green hydrogen.

These are ambitious goals, and wind energy alone holds the potential to deliver over half of the capacity needed to reach EU climate neutrality.

So, where does this leave us?

We have the ambition, and we have many of the solutions required. What we do not have, is time. We need to accelerate our progress.

A green future calls for swift implementation and scaling of proven technologies and solutions. It demands streamlined approval processes and requires us to leverage all available tools. No single solution will take us to our goal; we must address our energy challenges by fueling progress at every turn.

The tragic war in Ukraine has intensified the need for affordable, secure, and sustainable energy. Our ability to transform the green transition into a competitive advantage is crucial for accelerating our pace. By removing unnecessary barriers to innovation, we can further speed our progress.

The time is now.

I wish you all a successful and productive day. Thank you.

(Det talte ord gælder)