List of undesirable substances

The List of Undesirable Substances (LOUS) is aimed at Danish businesses and serves as a signal and guideline regarding substances that businesses should use less of in the long term or completely phase out. After four years' work, strategies for the substances on the list are now available.

From 2012-2015, the Danish EPA carried out comprehensive surveys and collected information about each of the 40 substances and substance groups on LOUS (2009). This means that today we have a much better idea of how the substances on the list impact human health and the environment, and not least of how to address the substances now and in future, where relevant.

The Danish EPA uses the results of the LOUS project in the EU to ensure common and ambitious regulation in the chemicals area. Denmark uses the LOUS project to find alternatives to some of the substances of very high concern, to increase supervision, to set threshold values for drinking water and soil, and to inform consumers and industries.

Businesses can use LOUS if they want to be one step ahead of regulation and replace substances of concern. The pages below include a status of our work on each of the 40 substances and substance groups as well as information about the project and the process.

List of Undesirable Substances and read about the criteria for selecting the substances.
Read about each of the 40 substances and substance groups (Danish) as well as about the status of our work in Danish, however all the surveys (Danish: kortlægning) and several of the reports from the implementation projects are in English.