Peter Calow, director, Environmental Assessment Institute, Copenhagen, Denmark

The career of Peter Calow has undergone two large changes of direction. In 1984 the British zoologist left basic research — his PhD from the University of Leeds was on the population ecology of aquatic snails — to work on applied ecotoxicology and environmental risk management. (see CV)

Twenty years on, Calow has made another big move, this time to environmental policy assessment. In November, the 57-year-old professor at the University of Sheffield was appointed the new director of the Danish Environmental Assessment Institute (EAI) in Copenhagen. For the next five years, he will be responsible for socioeconomic and cost–benefit analyses of a wide range of environmental policy options.

“My career has been a natural progression from experimental science to the policy arena,” he says. “I think that this is now the most exciting job I have ever had.”

The EAI was set up by the Danish government just two years ago, as an independent environmental think-tank. Thanks to its prominent founding director, Bjørn Lomborg, the small institute has quickly received attention from far beyond Denmark.

Calow appreciates the contribution of his predecessor. Lomborg, he says, asked important new questions — a practice that Calow wants to continue. He knows all about the controversy associated with using economic approaches to environmental problems. But thorough cost–benefit analysis is crucial to finding the best policy solutions to many environmental issues, from chemical legislation to climate change, he says.

As a PhD student, Calow was greatly influenced by the work of Nobel laureate Peter Medawar, particularly his book The Art of the Soluble. “Medawar taught me a lot about how to ask the right questions and design experimental approaches to answer them.” No wonder, then, that Calow has always advised his students to read the book.

Defining the right problems and questions will keep Calow busy for a while, as he and his staff develop a strategic plan for the EAI. Although priorities may shift, the institute's core activities will remain, he says. “We want to influence policy-makers and the public, and give inspiration to the academic community in Denmark, Europe and the whole world.”