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Around the world, smart grids are emerging as a universal tool to address a wide range of social and technical problems facing energy systems. Despite considerable research on these systems, the ways they differ in the local (re)production of power relations have so far been little discussed. This paper fills this gap by developing a “situated governmentality approach” in conversation with the critique of Foucauldian governmentality studies. By applying this approach to smart grid strategies in Germany (Smart Energy Showcases – Digital Agenda for the Energiewende, SINTEG) and India (National Smart Grid Mission, NSGM), we identify different ways in which power is mediated through situated governmentalities. While SINTEG employs technologies of power that promote a disciplinary regime, the exercise of power in the case of the NSGM displays many elements of a digitally enhanced sovereign approach. The findings reveal the range of governmental programmes that can be realized through smart grids and open up a perspective on the situated functioning of smart grids in energy transitions.

Die kommunale Wärmewende ist ein entscheidender Baustein für das Gelingen der Energiewende und die Steigerung der Resilienz von Städten. Sie erfordert eine drastische Reduzierung des Wärmebedarfs der Gebäude und die Nutzung erneuerbarer Energien für den verbleibenden Wärmebedarf. Die hier untersuchte Stadt Leipzig versucht die Wärmewende über energetische Sanierungsquartiere anzugehen. Beispielhaft, anhand von zwei Bestandsquartieren, werden Potenziale und Probleme des Quartiersansatzes diskutiert.

We analyse how ambitiously the underlying targets for the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the United Nations Agenda 2030 are set in terms of their semantic formulation and discuss the implications of this for policy making. Our analysis is based on classifying ambitiousness into three types: semantic, relative and absolute ambitiousness; in this paper, we mainly analyse semantic ambitiousness. We establish an evaluation framework that shows clear differences in semantic ambitiousness levels between SDG targets. Awareness of these differences is essential, as semantic ambitiousness also lays the foundation for evaluating other types of ambitiousness of the SDGs in international cross-country comparisons and national policy making processes. We also analyse how progress towards the targets has been reported in the Sustainable Development Report of the SDG Index and in the SDGs Progress Chart of the United Nations. Finally, we discuss possible reasons for the differences in the level of ambitiousness and provide recommendations for operationalising the targets. Our aim is to provide a better understanding of the variability of interpretations that can occur in the evaluation of different SDGs, and to improve the coherence between the goals in developing any future development goal frameworks beyond Agenda 2030.

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) aim to provide humanity with a global roadmap to sustainability. Official SDG indicators have been intensively developed, and they have a prominent and pronounced role as a key monitoring and policy instrument. Furthermore, various complementary or alternative indicator sets have been introduced at the global, regional and national levels. This article focuses on the risks related to the national indicators. The analysis is based on experiences from the preparation processes of sustainable development indicators in Finland and insights from indicator professionals and stakeholders in Finland and Germany. The risks related to overuse, nonuse and misuse of indicators are analyzed from the perspectives of indicator contents, processes of production and communication and external context factors. Opportunities for avoiding different risks and improving the desired societal impacts and influences of indicator usage are discussed. The concept of risk is helpful in terms of empirical diagnosis and for formulating mitigation recommendations.

The transformation to a post-fossil city is one of the central urban challenges of the 21st century, with heat transition representing an important part of this process. In Germany, a structural change commission has proposed a complete phase-out of coal by 2038. For the city of Leipzig, which is located in a mining region, this opens up the possibility of a post-fossil transformation. Leipzig started an energetic retrofitting process within its housing sector several years ago, and is now planning to phase-out coal-fired district heating as early as 2023. This heat transition could turn Leipzig into one of the pioneering cities of post-fossil transformation. However, such a transition will be accompanied by numerous challenges and problems in the financial, political, technological, and labor sectors. Using the example of Leipzig, we conducted a document analysis and semi-structured interviews to investigate how a transition of the heating sector is conceptualized and planned, which governance structures have emerged, and how they work. In addition, our paper outlines the main interests and goals of the key actors and stakeholders in this transition, as well as their competences and resources. We emphasize that while Leipzig has committed itself to ambitious climate goals, up to now, the city has had no systemic approach for reducing local emissions. Although a window of opportunity has opened for a post-fossil heat transition, this still remains at a niche level due to a lack of interest, path dependencies, and weak governance.