Malin Waak ties the strap of her bathrobe and takes the kitchen stairs down to the five-storey building's communal shower in the basement.
- In Sweden, water is taken for granted in a way that the Danes, for obvious reasons, have never done. Here we are dependent on the groundwater, she says.
After thirty years in Copenhagen, the Swedish freelance journalist still does not have his own shower in the apartment.
She is not alone in that. As late as 2020, it was estimated that up to 20,000 apartments in the Danish capital lack a private bathroom.
In the old workers' quarters at Vesterbro, many of the apartments are so small that there is simply no room for a shower.
Sharing a shower also forces frugality.
- Some have even had coin machines. Then you don't stand there and enjoy running water, says Malin Waak.
Denmark obtains basically all of its drinking water from groundwater. Surface water from lakes and streams is completely absent from the regular supply, which makes the country unique in Europe.
At the same time, Danish drinking water is more than twice as expensive as Swedish. A cubic meter of drinking water costs the equivalent of SEK 121, compared to SEK 54 in Sweden.
- It is not only the most expensive drinking water in Europe, it is probably the most expensive in the world, says Brian Jacobsen, lecturer in agricultural and resource economics at the University of Copenhagen.
The price difference is clearly visible in the statistics. The Danes use only two-thirds as much drinking water as the Swedes – 97 liters per person per day, compared to 140 liters in Sweden.
- The cost makes people think about their consumption. In addition, for many years we have had individual water metering in houses and apartments. You know exactly how much you consume and pay based on that, says Brian Jacobsen.
In Sweden, the model looks different. Here, the water bill largely consists of fixed charges. In multi-apartment buildings, the cost is usually included in the rent or monthly fee, although legal requirements now require individual measurement of hot water for new construction and major renovations.
For house owners, manual meter reading 1–2 times a year has long been the norm, but more and more municipalities are now switching to digital meters with automatic remote reading.
In the future, water may also become more expensive.
After several dry winters and alarms about record low water levels in southern Swedish lakes and waterways, the regional water company VA SYD is now investigating a model where households with high water consumption may in the future have to pay more.
- We have to start seeing water as a food and a finite resource. Simply producing more, for example by desalinating seawater, is not the solution, Karin van der Salm, federal director of VA SYD, has previously said in an interview with DN.
Mikael Elinder, professor of economics at Uppsala University, believes it is the wrong way to go.
- If you have a family with children of seven people, should they receive the same permitted amount of water as someone who has an overnight apartment? It can be very difficult, he says.
His solution is instead to do like the Danes and install water meters in every apartment, so that households pay for their own consumption.
In a new report from the research institute SNS, The right price for water, he examines how the Swedish water shortage can be remedied. The report is based on a study from Kumla, where individual meters were installed in roughly 500 apartments.
- When households started paying for their hot water, water consumption decreased by 18 percent. It is both good environmental policy and good distribution policy because the costs are distributed more fairly, says Mikael Elinder.
He believes that the Swedes must change their view of unlimited access to water as a human right.
- When we water our lawns to have them green-like, fill our swimming pools or shower several times a day, then it is really a luxury item.
In order to deal with acute water shortages, Mikael Elinder proposes a "crista taxa" instead of irrigation bans, which have become common, for example, on Gotland in the event of low groundwater levels and drought.
- It can be twice as high and signals that we now have to hold back on the water. Then we don't have to reduce consumption when we have good access to water just for the sake of it.
The recurring water alarms were not something that was noticed during the Swedish election campaign. It was different in the Danish general election in March, also called the "groundwater election".
There, the country's large-scale pig industry took center stage after revelations about how manure and feed crops contaminate the vital groundwater.
- "We shall take care of our groundwater" has become a slogan among many Danes. There is a strong awareness here that water is a vulnerable resource, says Brian Jacobsen at the University of Copenhagen.
Danish water consumption has decreased steadily for several decades. According to Brian Jacobsen, this is partly due to low flush technology.
- The technology has also made it easier to find leaks in the wiring network. There we are now down to seven percent.
In Sweden, a significantly larger proportion of the drinking water is lost in leaks: 17 to 19 percent, according to Svenskt Vatten.
According to the trade association, the price of drinking water has risen by an average of 7.3 percent in 2026. Despite the increases, it is still cheap, says Mikael Elinder.
He compares it to the price of a can of energy drink.
- You drink approximately 700-800 liters of water in a year and a cubic meter costs maybe SEK 30. It is smaller than a Nocco or a Ramlösa at Pressbyrån, he says.
In the apartment on Vesterbro in Copenhagen, Malin Waak takes out the latest bill from the municipal water company. It shows exactly how much hot and cold water she has used and how the consumption compares to previous periods.
- I think it plays a huge role. You also get a little triggered. It bothers me if I have used five liters more than the month before, she says.
When Swedes are now asked in campaigns to turn off the tap when brushing their teeth and fill the washing machines, it has long been everyday for Malin Waak.
But she also thinks that Danish frugality can lead to exaggerations.
- To "do Danish dishes" for example - wash dishes without rinsing off the detergent afterwards. It's like shampooing your hair and then just going straight out.
In the "bathing club" down in the basement, the toilet was recently closed because the water is considered too expensive. There are rarely long queues, but sometimes conflicts arise over intimate shaving or hairballs in the shower.
It happens that Malin Waak herself pushes the boundaries. When she recently made soup in a pot that didn't fit in the cramped kitchen sink, there was only one way out:
- Then I snuck into the shower like a thief in the night.
