Summary Southeast of Berlin and near the Polish border lies the region of Lausitz, one of Europe’s largest brown coal fields that supplies the coal for Europe’s third most polluting industrial plant: Vattenfall’s Jänschwalde power plant. [1] The industry turns ever-greater parts of the landscape into open pits and devours one village after another. Most…
Summary The example of Told shows how ideas to reduce energy poverty imported from the Global South are also helpful on the European continent. The project integrates the three pillars of sustainability—social, economic and ecological—in a commendable fashion and, additionally and implicitly, tackles ethnic stigmatisation. It is an encouraging example, because minimal efforts have led…
Summary In the midst of a seemingly rich Germany, numerous towns, villages and rural districts are broke. The pathway to insolvency typically includes the following steps. Over the course of ten to twenty years, a community heaps up debt because revenue is permanently too low. To raise funds, towns then sell assets and establish public-private…
Summary The energy transition in Scotland profits from a land reform that has inverted historic property relations. Historically, Scotland is viewed as one of the most important examples for the enclosure of the commons.[1] Up until the 19th century, large estates in Scotland were still being commodified [2] and sold. More often than not, the…
Ungersheim, a former mining town in the Alsace region, has successfully implemented a local socio-ecological transition strategy. Their success was based on the town autonomously designing its transition pathway, instead of following French government guidelines.[1] As the mayor, François Mensch, tells us, there are three dimensions to Ungersheim’s autonomy. The first two obvious dimensions are…