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Another EMF science event in Oslo!
Another EMF science event in Oslo!
In 2024 I covered an event in Oslo on screens, radiation and health, with the renowned EMF scientist Devra Davis (Rohde, 2024a). The post was shared internationally (Flydal, 2024) and also translated into Swedish by the organization Miljöföreningen Vågbrytaren (Rohde, 2024b).
As an advocate for more research on the health effects of electromagnetic fields (EMFs), I could not miss the opportunity to take part in another live event in Oslo, where I live, with international EMF scientists on stage.
On Saturday 18 October 2025, the topic was insects.
The event covered both basic research on the electromagnetic nature of insects, as well as research on the effects of electropollution on insects.
In addition to the EMF scientists, three presenters discussed power policies, wind turbines, power distribution systems, as well as philosophy of science and risk management in the field of environmental science (or environmental chemistry).
I’ll provide a brief summary of each EMF scientist’s presentation, dividing my report into a few blog posts.
From each presentation, I’ll highlight one or two interesting points and add my own comments where relevant.
For each scientist, I have created tables summarizing their research, including the number of studies, citations, and links to each publication.
Scientist gathering in Oslo
This specific Saturday, October 2025, the scientists gathered at the House of Literature, in Oslo, to share their domain knowledge, their own research, and ideas for future directions.
In addition to Norwegians Einar Flydal and Else Nordhagen, who arranged the seminar, EMF scientists from across Europe had been invited to give their presentations. The EMF scientists are depicted in the map above.
Introduction: Einar Flydal & Else Nordhagen
Introduction by
Einar Flydal and Else Nordhagen
Research profiles
Table: Overview of Else K. Nordhagen’s publications in Semantic Scholar.3
Click to expand a full list of Else Nordhagen’s research (in Semantic Scholar)
Table: All publications for Else K. Nordhagen in Semantic Scholar.³
Table: Overview of Einar Flydal’s publications in Semantic Scholar.³
Click to expand a full list of Einar Flydal’s research (in Semantic Scholar)
Table: All publications for Einar Flydal in Semantic Scholar.³
Flydal & Nordhagen at the event
Flydal and Nordhagen, have taken up a research interest in biological and health effects of electromagnetic fields, including radiofrequency radiation, after retiring from the mobile company Telenor.
In their own time they have authored, translated and coauthored several books, and they have published original research.
At the event, Flydal acted as host.
Flydal began with a brief introduction providing a foundation for the seminar, including references that have documented the insect decline in Norway (see image below), and the increase in global exposure levels (Bandara & Carpenter, 2018).
Additional international references on insect decline were provided by Alain Thill later in the seminar.
Einar Flydal also informed the audience that one of the scheduled scientists, Arne Follestad, had to withdraw his talk after being encouraged to do so by his employer, the Norwegian Institute for Nature Research (NINA). The reason was not expressed in plain terms.
This was unfortunate for those who had hoped to hear about light pollution, a topic on which Follestad has written a report for the Norwegian Public Roads Administration (Vegvesenet) (Follestad, 2014).
After Flydal’s introductory remarks, Nordhagen gave an introduction to the basics of electromagnetism. She recently published the book “Safer Days in a World Full of Radiation” (my translation, original title is Tryggere i en strålende hverdag) availble in Norwegian. The book received an excellent review in the Norwegian magazine Helsemagasinet (Mysterud, 2025), particularly for being well-written and her ability to communicate a complex field of science concisely without losing essential information.
While Nordhagen’s book is only available in Norwegian, Nordhagen and Flydal have coauthored two English-language articles (Nordhagen & Flydal, 2023, 2025), both of which have received international recognition from other EMF scientists (e.g. Lin (2025) and Melnick et al.(2025)).
But it was not their research, which has critiqued the ICNIRP guidelines and a recent authoritative review, that was the topic of this seminar. It was time to hear about insects. First up was Swiss scientist and beekeeper Daniel Favre, whose talk I’ll return to in my next post (Rohde, 2025).
References
Bandara, P., & Carpenter, D. O. (2018). Planetary electromagnetic pollution: It is time to assess its impact. The Lancet Planetary Health, 2(12), e512–e514. https://doi.org/10.1016/S2542-5196(18)30221-3
Flydal, E. (2024, November 20). Seminaret på Litteraturhuset i Oslo går kloden rundt. Jeg har noe på hjertet ... https://einarflydal.com/2024/11/20/seminaret-pa-litteraturhuset-i-oslo-gar-kloden-rundt/
Follestad, A. (2014). Effekter av kunstig nattbelysning på naturmangfoldet-en litteraturstudie. https://www.nina.no/archive/nina/PppBasePdf/rapport/2014/1081.pdf
KTH-Library/semanticscholar. (2025). [Computer software]. KTH Library - Bibliometrics. https://github.com/KTH-Library/semanticscholar (Original work published 2020)
Lin, J. C. (2025). Health and safety practices and policies concerning human exposure to RF/microwave radiation. Frontiers in Public Health, 13. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpubh.2025.1619781
Melnick, R. L., Moskowitz, J. M., Héroux, P., Mallery-Blythe, E., McCredden, J. E., Herbert, M., Hardell, L., Philips, A., Belpoggi, F., Frank, J. W., Scarato, T., Kelley, E., & On Behalf of the International Commission on the Biological Effects of Electromagnetic Fields (ICBE-EMF). (2025). The WHO-commissioned systematic reviews on health effects of radiofrequency radiation provide no assurance of safety. Environmental Health, 24(1), 70. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12940-025-01220-4
Mysterud, I. (2025). Lettlest og oversiktlig om stråling og helse. Helsemagasinet, 16(4), 96–98. https://www. vof. no/
Nordhagen, E. K., & Flydal, E. (2023). Self-referencing authorships behind the ICNIRP 2020 radiation protection guidelines. Reviews on Environmental Health, 38(3), 531–546. https://doi.org/10.1515/reveh-2022-0037
Nordhagen, E. K., & Flydal, E. (2025). WHO to build neglect of RF-EMF exposure hazards on flawed EHC reviews? Case study demonstrates how “no hazards” conclusion is drawn from data showing hazards. Reviews on Environmental Health, 40(2), 277–288. https://doi.org/10.1515/reveh-2024-0089
Rohde, M. (2024a). Screens and Health: EMF Scentist Devra Davis Visits Norway. The EpiWaves Blog. https://madsrohde.com/posts/en/davis-disconnect-oslo/
Rohde, M. (2024b). Skärmar och hälsa: Strålningsforskaren Devra Davis på besök i Norge. EpiWaves Blog. https://madsrohde.com/posts/sv/davis-disconnect-oslo/
Rohde, M. (2025). European Scientists Gather to Discuss Electromagnetic Fields, Insects, and the Global Insect Decline: Episode II, Daniel Favre [Upcoming blog post]. EpiWaves Blog. https://madsrohde.com/posts/en/emf-seminar-oslo-2025-episode-2/
Footnotes
Photo by Mads Rohde, 2025. Licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.↩︎
Image from the Internet.↩︎
Data retrieved by use of Semanticscholar R package (KTH-Library/Semanticscholar, 2020/2025) (data source: Semantic Scholar API).↩︎
Citation
BibTeX citation:
@online{rohde2025,
author = {Rohde, Mads},
title = {European {Scientists} {Gather} to {Discuss} {Electromagnetic}
{Fields,} {Insects,} and the {Global} {Insect} {Decline:} {Episode}
{I,} {Flydal} \& {Nordhagen}},
date = {2025-11-09},
url = {https://madsrohde.com/posts/en/emf-seminar-oslo-2025-episode-1/},
langid = {en}
}
For attribution, please cite this work as:
Rohde, M. (2025, November 9). European Scientists Gather to Discuss
Electromagnetic Fields, Insects, and the Global Insect Decline: Episode
I, Flydal & Nordhagen. EpiWaves Blog. https://madsrohde.com/posts/en/emf-seminar-oslo-2025-episode-1/