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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.

Coal is formed from vegetation at high temperatures and pressures, cut off from the air. The older the coal, the more carbon and energy it contains. Deposits are located in all continents.

Open-cast mining destroys the landscape of both the pit and the surrounding area. Efforts to restore these areas often fail and the surface above the underground mines sinks. A chapter from the Coal Atlas.

Digging up coal and using it to generate electricity churns out emissions that intensify the greenhouse effect. Coal is one of the biggest sources of climate change. A chapter from the Coal Atlas.

The Coal Atlas is available in a printed version, in PDF, epub, mobi format and as an online dossier. All graphics and texts are under the open Creative Commons license CC-BY-SA: You can share and adapt the work in compliance with these conditions. All graphics can be found in different formats and can be downloaded here.

The US coal industry is losing market share to gas and renewables. The nation’s dirtiest fuel is giving way to cleaner alternatives. A chapter from the Coal Atlas.

With the promise of “clean coal”, the industry intends to store carbon dioxide underground. However, this method of dealing with the climate crisis fails for both technical and economic reasons.

Coal is the fuel that powered the Industrial Revolution and the transformation of economies and societies over the last two centuries. Its benefits have been huge – while the damage it has wrought was ignored for too long.

Protests against strip mining and coal power are gaining support from left-wing groups. Stefanie Groll and Simon Straub explore the chances of a new alliance.

Days after the Paris attacks, Europe is only slowly awakening from a state of shock. The events served as a painful reminder of our vulnerabilities from within and the daunting threats we face from abroad. A reflection on seven challenges looming on Europe’s horizon. 

From China to Russia to Iran, voices questioning the universality of liberal democracy are growing louder. How confidently can and should the West stand up for democracy and human rights in the world? 

Thomas Fatheuer, Lili Fuhr and Barbara Unmüßig of the Heinrich Böll Foundation set out to explore the basic assumptions, hypotheses and proposed solutions of the green economy and to illustrate and criticize their effects in practice.

Climate change requires urgent action, as hardly any government will deny. Business is also beginning to rise to the challenge. Nevertheless, the voluntary commitments being developed for the climate summit in Paris (COP21) are falling short.

The forest fires in Borneo and Sumatra are the worst fires in almost 20 years. Experts agree that slash-and-burn agriculture is their immediate cause. What can be done to improve the situation?

What happens to refugees on their way to the European Union? Serbian novelist Vladimir Arsenijević has travelled the Balkan route and kept a diary of his journey.

One of the great merits of Jutta Kill's timely discussion paper is that it shows why current debates over the economic valuation of nature matter.

Moscow is now preoccupied with bringing the strategy initiated by Bashar al-Assad to perfection: After the attempt to convince western states that the only alternatives to Assad are chaos and the “Islamic State” fell through, the powers in the centre are to be weakened and to be virtually driven into the arms of the “IS”.

I agree with the main thrust of Jutta Kill’s essay, and am always pleased to be quoted. A comment by Herman Daly.

Las Vegas seems to be an apt place to launch a risky corporate gamble that could destroy the livelihoods of millions of small-scale farmers.

The AKP has gained the absolute majority in Turkey’s recent snap elections, allowing it to continue to rule without a coalition partner. Deep rifts within Turkish society, however, remain. A take on the elections by Kristian Brakel, office director in Istanbul.

During the autumn semester 2015 expert lecturers from Tanzania, Netherlands, Germany and South Africa join a series of discussions about the right to food with students at partner universities within the scope of the project EcoFairTrade.

Rigorous disclosure requirements and increased transparency are vital to reclaim the space for citizens to be able to demand climate justice.

In an interview with Heinrich Böll Foundation Brasil, journalist Thamyra Thâmara, from Complexo do Alemão, speaks about the importance of digital media for popular communicators in the favelas–spaces which are stigmatized by the mainstream media and portrayed as impoverished and violent.

Declaring Serbia a safe third country was the first of Hungarian repeated violations of human rights. Hungary turned the humanitarian crisis into a purely political issue. It seems that Europe too will choose to follow the politics of closed doors.

On November 8, Myanmar votes for a new parliament. What do the parties stand for and what can they change? An interview with Sui Khar, Joint Secretary-General of the Chin National Front.

Myanmar prepares for the second nation-wide poll in 25 years. The elections in November 2015 promise to be a watershed for the country’s democratisation.

Myanmar and its power elites do not have experience with electoral politics. That makes Myanmar’s elections exciting, and at the same time risky.

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What is at stake? Will the elections be free? Who is competing and how does the electoral process work? Our FAQ on the most democratic elections since 1960 in Myanmar.

After successfully having put its candidate in the presidential seat in May 2015, national conservative party PiS has now managed to win an absolute majority in the parliament. Not a single left-wing party has made it through the elections. It remains to be seen how the electorate will feel represented by this shift to the right in parliament.