<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">

<p>Coal energy landscapes have changed dramatically over the last decades, including geographic shifts in production and consumption, technological changes that have reduced labour demand and led to relatively new mining practices (e.g. invasive mountain-top approaches), changed economic footprints, a shutdown of capacities or a complete end of mining in many regions with massive impacts on regional and local economies, community well-being, social capital, et cetera. Then the Covid-19 pandemic and Russia´s invasion of Ukraine have fundamentally affected the global economy, disrupted energy markets, and shattered existing estimates about development trends, challenging the progress and speed of the low-carbon energy transition and coal phase-out. This article provides a brief reflection on the changing landscapes of coal and their possible futures, and serves as an introduction to the Special Issue of Moravian Geographical Reports on “The death of coal in the energy transition? Regional perspectives”.</p>
</abstract>

Coal energy landscapes have changed dramatically over the last decades, including geographic shifts in production and consumption, technological changes that have reduced labour demand and led to relatively new mining practices (e.g. invasive mountain-top approaches), changed economic footprints, a shutdown of capacities or a complete end of mining in many regions with massive impacts on regional and local economies, community well-being, social capital, et cetera. Then the Covid-19 pandemic and Russia´s invasion of Ukraine have fundamentally affected the global economy, disrupted energy markets, and shattered existing estimates about development trends, challenging the progress and speed of the low-carbon energy transition and coal phase-out. This article provides a brief reflection on the changing landscapes of coal and their possible futures, and serves as an introduction to the Special Issue of Moravian Geographical Reports on “The death of coal in the energy transition? Regional perspectives”.

The evolving energy landscapes of coal: Windows on the past and influences on the future

School of Geographical Sciences and Urban Planning and Julie Anne Wrigley Global Futures Laboratory

Department of Geography, Faculty of Science

Moravian Geographical Reports

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

Coal energy landscapes have changed dramatically over the last decades, including geographic shifts in production and consumption, technological changes that...

The evolving energy landscapes of coal: Windows on the past and influences on the future

Published Online: Jan 07, 2023

Page range: 228 - 236

Received: Sep 10, 2022

Accepted: Dec 19, 2022

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/mgr-2022-0015

Keywords
coal mining, energy landscapes, energy transitions, coal phase-out, energy crisis

© 2022 Martin J. Pasqualetti et al., published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

The evolving energy landscapes of coal: Windows on the past and influences on the future

Published Online: Jan 07, 2023

Page range: 228 - 236

Received: Sep 10, 2022

Accepted: Dec 19, 2022

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/mgr-2022-0015

Keywordscoal mining, energy landscapes, energy transitions, coal phase-out, energy crisis

© 2022 Martin J. Pasqualetti et al., published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

Keywords
coal mining, energy landscapes, energy transitions, coal phase-out, energy crisis