We toured the US Appalachia region with energy expert Timon Wehnert to visit communities in Kentucky, New York, and Pennsylvania and see how they are transitioning from a coal-based economy. 

A discussion in Whitesburg, Kentucky featured a talk by Timon Wehnert of the Wuppertal Institute as part of a tour of US coal communities sponsored by the Heinrich Böll Foundation North America.

With states, cities, and citizens willing to double down and move ahead with climate commitments, the global community can still count on many Americans’ willingness to act responsibly in support of global climate actions, even if their White House is not. Unfortunately, such activism will not make up for the failure of the Trump administration to make good on its international climate finance obligation.

How some former coal regions have transformed themselves in preparation for life after coal.

As policymakers in Ohio and elsewhere look to modernize their aging electric grid, concepts in Germany’s changing energy system suggest how today’s decisions can set the stage for a greater share of renewables and more energy security.

UT-Austin’s energy system operates as an island, outside of the electricity grid that covers most of Texas. It's getting more efficient over time, avoiding millions of dollars in fuel costs. 

Sometimes called the "Rodney Dangerfield" of the energy industry, the district energy concept has fueled Denmark's shift from fossil fuels. Energy efficiency advocates want to encourage more district energy projects in Texas.

Facing the Arab oil embargo of the 1970s, Denmark shifted from fossil fuels. Texas responded differently. Here's a look at how things went for each.   

While utilities in Ohio and elsewhere have sought “around market” charges after affiliated coal and nuclear plants became less competitive, Germany’s large utilities are charting new paths forward.

A new law that took effect in Poland earlier this month could kill growing competition from land-based wind farms by expanding setback requirements tenfold and increasing tax burdens.

Despite an ongoing freeze on state policies to boost clean energy in Ohio, efforts to increase energy efficiency and renewable energy are underway in Cleveland and the rest of Cuyahoga County.

In relation to the rest of Europe, the UK’s role as market, nuclear, and shale gas champion has brought its policies into sharp relief in contrast to countries such as Germany and Austria.

At first glance, the Austrian performance in the energy sector looks quite bright: In the year 2014, about 33% of the gross final energy consumption was provided by renewable energy sources.

In 2015, a new State Energy Policy came into effect in the Czech Republic. While government plans still rely heavily on new nuclear reactors, new government strategies on renewables raise hopes.

2015 saw Polish PV increase by 240% and wind power generation by 40%. Despite these impressive numbers, Poland still remains the kingdom of coal.  

As it is in Ohio and elsewhere in the United States, the coal industry in Poland is declining amid economic and environmental pressures. And the industry’s political and cultural importance is prompting calls for government action to save it.

In addition to the usual, global overview of status and trends in reactor building and operating, as well as the traditional comparison between deployment trend in the nuclear power and renewable energy sectors, the 2016 edition of the World Nuclear Industry Status Report (WNISR) provides an assessment of the trends of the economic health of some of the major players in the industry.

After several decades of stagnation, the discovery of natural gas deposits in the Mediterranean and the introduction of domestic renewable energy could signal a rapid energy transition for Israel.

China set world records, again, in 2015 with its rapid renewable energy development, but China's continued overreliance on coal suggests a long road ahead towards a true clean energy transition.

In less than a decade, Uruguayan citizens have been privileged witnesses of a fast change, a true revolution, in the energy sector, and they are beginning to perceive its results.

South Africa shows how quickly an energy transition can be. In four years, with coal and nuclear power stations on hold, South Africa's  renewable energy program has nearly 100 plants in development.

India is poised to show the value of renewable energies to developing economies. Its new targets, government programs, alongside other factors, seem to be moving India into a renewable energy age.

The Fukushima nuclear disaster put Japanese nuclear power on hold. In the five years since, Japan's policies have ushered in renewable energy, but continued coal expansion remains likely.

The struggle between coal-fired and renewable energy plants in the Philippines is heated.

Thirty years after the biggest nuclear disaster at Chernobyl nuclear power plant, Ukraine is still seriously dependent on nuclear energy. It is high time for Ukraine to take the path of nuclear phase-out.

A discussion on coal, energy, and sustainable economic transition in West Virginia

The transition to a low-carbon energy system can only succeed if we switch to renewable energy and energy efficiency while parting from fossil fuels. Already, the global share of renewable energy in electricity production has increased sharply. Nevertheless, many new coal power plants, anticipated to run for many decades, were connected to the grid in recent years. How do these divergent trends add up? 

"From Bundestag to Bluegrass" is a five-part web and radio series examining Germany’s energy transition—and its potential lessons for Kentucky—reported by Erica Peterson for WFPL News in Louisville.

Germany is phasing out nuclear power and has come to rely more on coal for its electricity. Despite a steep rise in renewable energy, the use of coal is endangering Germany’s ambitious target to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions.

TECN Media Fellow Sandy Hausman travels to tiny Estonia to learn about offshore wind development. 

As the fifth largest oil producer in the world, Canada's domestic and foreign policy is shaped considerably by energy and resource issues. In the nine years under the Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper, Canada has focused primarily on its oil industry and on strengthening its position as an energy power – without regard for the environment and local populations. In that context, the Harper government presented economic growth as being dependent on an aggressive expansion of the energy sector. However, that line of reasoning is now losing its force.

In this 5-part audio series, Sandy Hausman, an HBF Energy and Climate Media Fellow for 2015, reports on recent advancements in marine energy development in Europe and the U.S. These stories were originally published for Virginia Public Radio. 

In the first week of June, the Czech government adopted an action plan that is supposed to lead to the construction of four new reactors in the country—first in Dukovany and then in Temelín. The government’s decision, however, is not the product of a rational political debate; it is the result of the long-term erosion of responsible governing. Therefore, the Czech Republic can serve as a textbook case of how decisions about the future of energy should not be made.  

Sandy Hausman, a 2015 Media Fellow of Heinrich Boell North America, investigates the secrets behind Denmark's success with wind power in part one of her series.

Part two of a series by Sandy Hausman, a 2015 Energy and Climate Media Fellow for Heinrich Böll North America, on offshore wind power in the US and Europe. Part 2 explores the linkages between wind farming in Denmark and Virginia.

Four years after Fukushima, global nuclear power generation continues to slow. This year's World Nuclear Industry Status Report takes a look at the current empirical facts and figures of the nuclear industry worldwide. 

Violent conflicts and security crises around the world have many different causes and effects. The vast majority of them, however, are in one way or another related to energy policy. Yet making this link apparent to policy makers has been challenging. Experts from the foreign policy, security and energy communities have been reluctant to fully grasp the security implications of promising green energy technology and market developments.

Stephanie Joyce, a 2015 Energy and Climate Media Fellow for Heinrich Böll North America, investigates how the tiny Danish island of Bornholm makes electricity demand meet supply in part one of her series.

Smart energy infrastructure and an entrepreneurial spirit will play an important role in driving energy transitions around the world. At the end of June, Cem Oezdemir, Co-Chairman of the German Green Party, travelled to San Francisco to witness how innovative solutions are driving low-carbon development in the Bay Area. We spoke with him about how California could serve as a model for German start-ups.

The restructuring of the energy system in one of the world’s leading industrialized nations is undoubtedly a highly ambitious undertaking. There is no blueprint for this energy transition that would offer a simple step-by-step procedure to follow. There is one thing that the German energy transition certainly is not: an island of its own that isolates Germany’s energy economy. On the contrary, a quick overview of the world’s state of affairs with regard to energy shows that the global energy transition is now picking up speed.

How does Denmark plan to transition to 100 percent renewable energy by 2050 -- and how does it already get almost half of its electricity from renewables? Stephanie Joyce, a 2015 Energy and Climate Media Fellow for Heinrich Böll North America, has an answer in part three and the final installment of her series from Bornholm, Denmark.

During his recent visit to Washington, D.C., we spoke with Jürgen Trittin, Member of the German Parliament, about European energy independence in the wake of the Ukraine crisis, the role of TTIP in enhancing energy security across the Atlantic, and how the German Energiewende can serve as a model for policy makers worldwide.

Part two of a series by Stephanie Joyce, another 2015 Energy and Climate Media Fellow for Heinrich Böll North America, in Bornholm, Denmark - or as she puts it, "a real-life test lab for the grid of the future." Listen and read more at Inside Energy:

This week The Heinrich Böll Foundation is hosting a delegation of U.S. state legislators on the EU Low Carbon Economy Tour 2015.

Germany’s energy transition – or Energiewende – has created a global market for renewable energies, such as wind and solar, by promoting the rapid build-up of these technologies through a stable policy framework. As a result, the cost of both wind and solar has dramatically decreased over the past few years. This is now enabling other countries to follow suit, in particular the United States.

People have been fantasizing about hydrogen cars forever. It was the car of the future before the Prius and the Tesla were the car of the future. TECN Media Fellow Peter Thomson reports from Berlin on the development of hydrogen-power cars in Germany.

Too much solar and wind power. Really? Is that possible? It’s a good problem to have, because if we’re going to beat climate change, we’re going to need way more low-carbon energy than we get now. But it’s still a problem for Germany.

Solar power production has grown more than 25 times over the last decade in Germany, spurred largely by big incentives for small producers to get into the market. But sunshine and wind power are intermittent, so engineers and others are looking for ways to balance out the flow of these renewable power sources through new storage technologies.

On December 15, 2014, the Heinrich Böll Foundation hosted representatives of renewable energy associations from each of the Baltic states – Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania – in Washington. See interviews with them here about diversifying the energy mix to include more renewables.

Today, 60 percent of people in Copenhagen's city core commute by bike. In the greater Copenhagen area, over 40 percent do. “It’s not something that’s in Copenhagen’s genes, or that we’re weirder or stranger than any other people on earth,” Kabell says. “Every city can do this.”

On December 4, 2014, the Heinrich Boell Foundation hosted representatives from the Sustainable Finance Lab and Carbon Tracker for a transatlantic discussion about the possible financial risks of the carbon bubble. You can listen the recording of the discussion and find the event materials here.

Standing on the shore of the Baltic sea a few miles outside of Copenhagen, Denmark, the view’s about what you’d expect. Rocky shore, grey horizon, a boat here or there. But this shore is special. Look up, and you’ll see — and hear — three giant offshore wind turbines cutting through the air. Each stands 500 feet tall, with three blades (each close to 200 feet long), spinning non-stop.

About an hour’s drive outside of Sevilla, Spain’s old city, past grazing black-footed pigs and olive orchards, sits the Abengoa Solucar complex, and it’s truly a sight: Imagine cresting a hill and then all of the sudden seeing several large towers, over 500 feet high, with hundreds of beams of light striking them — solar rays from an army of mirrors arrayed in a circle on the ground below. They’re called heliostats.

Germany's short-term 2020 climate targets are in jeopardy. This is a serious drawback: if the Energiewende should prove ineffective on the climate front, it will fall short on its declared objective and discourage other countries from following suit. The German government is now taking first steps to fight the country's coal power.

This fall the Heinrich Böll Foundation hosted a delegation of civil society representatives and journalists from Poland for a study tour to Washington, D.C., Pennsylvania and New York State to gain a better understanding of the effects that natural gas exploration have had on local communities along the Marcellus Shale. Tomasz Ulanowski, a reporter for the Polish daily newspaper Wyborcza, wrote this report.

Even the strongest proponents of the Energiewende agree that Germany needs to reform its energy system to accommodate the next influx of renewables while maintaining security of supply of conventional power at all times. The United States has extensive experience with capacity markets from which the German debate could benefit. As such, a German delegation consisting of national and state energy policy makers and experts will visit the United States from September 1 to 5, 2014.

Up in Smoke - Climate Desk Watch on YouTube This external content requires your consent. Please note our privacy policy. Holzweiler, a tidy village of stone houses clustered around an aging cathedral, is  precariously close to one of Europe's largest open-pit coal mines.

What if there were a way for Boulder to visualize what would happen if the city were to take more aggressive action for reducing carbon emissions, or to map what it would look like to meet its renewable energy targets through municipalization? Lego blocks and “Change Cards” provide just such a tool, offering insight into the technological, economic and political challenges to making Boulder’s clean-energy and carbon-reducing visions a reality. 

Wind turbines, bikeable cities, clean air and water. How do they do that?

While waste-to-energy incinerators remain a controversial topic among U.S. environmentalists, there’s been little such debate in Sweden as the country increased its waste burning capacity over the past decade.

As a city of islands, Stockholm was in a unique position, geographically speaking, to implement congestion pricing for motorists. Just 18 crossings exist where cars and trucks can enter or exit the inner city. When it comes to politics, though, the city had no special advantage.

As Oktoberfest rages on, German scientists are working out a way to protect a key beer ingredient from climate change.

In an industry whose leadership still skews heavily towards men, it’s very likely Qvinnovindar is the only company of its kind anywhere in the world.

In the U.S., there’s rising anxiety and speculation about how flat or falling electricity demand could affect utilities’ long-term business models. Here in Denmark, though, electric companies have long operated in a slow- or no-growth market, and they continue to invest in further lowering customers’ energy use.

Writing about Germany’s clean energy transition is notoriously difficult – for a number of reasons. And writing about it in book form is probably the hardest of all. Paul Hockenos reviews four recent titles that tackle the topic.

Over the last decade, the US has seen a shale gas rush. This rapid development has put to a heavy burden on the environment and the human health. Given the controversial experience in the US, more voices in Europe call for an EU-wide moratorium on shale gas – for good reasons, argues this new report.

Energy from renewables is getting less and less expensive – while at the same time, private households have to pay more and more for it. This is obviously not due to the German Renewable Energy Act, which has been adopted by more than 50 countries meanwhile.

In its tar sands, Canada has the biggest oil reserves worldwide after Saudi Arabia. While delaying climate action at home, the Canadian government is undermining international efforts in fighting climate change. Low carbon fuel standards in the EU and California or the denial to build the Keystone XL pipeline through the US would be a major setback for Canada’s export of oil from tar sands.

During the Ontario Renewable Energy Tour, the Heinrich Böll Foundation, the Pembina Institute, the Climate Action Network Canada, and the United Church of Canada presented their report on Harvesting Clean Energy on Ontario Farms.

No other industrial nation is going to abandon nuclear power as fast as Germany. Isn’t this an exaggerated panic reaction? No, argues Ulrich Beck, a German sociologist and risk expert. It is not the product of German Angst. It’s the economy, stupid! In the long run, nuclear power will become more expensive, while renewable energy will become cheaper.

Following the nuclear accident at the Fukushima power plant, and in advance of the 25th anniversary of the Chernobyl disaster, the Heinrich Böll Stiftung and the Worldwatch Institute hosted a transatlantic roundtable. The discussion focused on the current state of nuclear power in the world.

In cooperation with 25x’25, the Heinrich Böll Stiftung North America hosted a transatlantic roundtable discussion on its new report Beyond Biofuels: Renewable Energy Opportunities for U.S. Farmers.  

This session at the Environmental Grantmakers Association (EGA) Fall Retreat in Anchorage, Alaska, focused on “Investments Into Renewable Energies –What policies do Work?” Andreas Krämer of the Berlin-based Ecologic Institute and Wilson Rickerson of Meister Consulting addressed differences and similarities of renewable energies in Germany and the US.

Around the world there is growing recognition to address the economic and climate crises together rather than separately.  President Barack Obama has touted a green energy sector as the best chance of jumpstarting the economy, putting Americans back to work, and securing the country’s standing in a post-carbon world.