Inheriting energy infrastructures: from deindustrialisation to decarbonisation

Around the world, sites associated with coal, oil and gas are being transformed into ‘renewable’ energy hubs or cultural ‘incubators’ for the so-called green transition. This article argues that repurposing and ‘heritagising’ such infrastructures without any deep understanding of the injustices and inequities of carbon modernity risks masking structural continuities between historic and ongoing systems of exploitation and environmental destruction. The article develops around three case studies in Europe: the Zollverein Complex in Germany’s Ruhr, where corporate interests have long shaped and compromised transition narratives; Thor Park in Genk, Belgium, where heritage serves as an affective backdrop for a market-led vision of the green transition; and E-WERK Luckenwalde in Brandenburg, where a decommissioned lignite power station has been reactivated as a community-embedded energy system and contemporary arts venue. Tracing a spectrum from corporate instrumentalisation to prefigurative community practice, the article calls for heritage approaches that go beyond symbolic nostalgia and commercial regeneration. Drawing out the contradictions and complexities of decarbonisation, we advocate for practices that reckon with the social and cultural legacies of carbon modernity and actively cultivate new imaginaries and capacities in support of a more just transition.