Can the unique success of Loos-en-Gohelle be repeated elsewhere?

Loos-en-Gohelle is a town which has many features. Originally, it was a small coal mining community in the Pas-de-Calais département. More recently it was affected by the downturns in this industry, and is now part of a pilot experiment to monitor the effects of energy transition and to test an alternative social model. The mayor’s deep-rooted dream is to create a better world for and with his fellow citizens and, in so doing, he is reinventing politics. Leading researchers and political decision-makers from all over the world have come to see what the next steps will be for the inhabitants of this region who seem to stop at nothing. The town has a spoil heap as high as the Egyptian pyramids, wrapped in a wool scarf, with a solar power station at its feet. Everything which has taken place here over the past twenty years could well herald what our society will be like in the coming decades if others dare to dream and follow suit.