kapitalutvalg

Kapitalutvalg is a term used in Norwegian and Danish for a committee responsible for overseeing capital investments within a government, municipality, or organization. It focuses on long-term assets and expenditures rather than day-to-day operations. The committee helps ensure that capital projects align with strategy, financial sustainability, and risk appetite.

Responsibilities include evaluating and approving major projects such as infrastructure, facilities, technology platforms; reviewing business cases; performing financial analysis (net present value, ROI, internal rate of return), lifecycle costs; assessing risks, legal and regulatory compliance, environmental and social impacts; and setting investment priorities and policies for the capital budget.

Composition typically includes senior leadership (CEO or mayor), financial director or CFO, heads of relevant departments, project management office, risk or compliance representative, and possibly external experts. Meetings may be scheduled regularly; the committee may issue recommendations to the board or council and may delegate certain approvals within predefined thresholds.

Process often involves pre-screening of proposals, development of formal business cases, scoring against criteria, due diligence, procurement considerations, and public reporting. In public sector contexts, it operates within statutory frameworks and debt limits, and its work is subject to audit and transparency requirements.

Variants exist across countries and organizations; some use different names or have broader or more focused mandates (for example combining with asset management or project portfolio governance). Related concepts include capital expenditure (Capex), project portfolio management, and governance of financial investments.