Independence from the power grid can be pursued by achieving total self-sufficient electricity supply. Such an energy supply model might be particularly interesting for settlements located in rural areas where enough space is available for energy generation installations. This article evaluates how and at what cost electricity demand of residential users across Germany and the Czech Republic could be covered by hybrid renewable energy generation systems consisting of photovoltaics, micro-generation wind turbines and batteries. High-resolution reanalysis data are used to calculate necessary system sizes over a large area by simultaneously accounting for the temporal variability of renewable energy. For every potential location in the research area, the hybrid system requirements for clusters of 50 self-sufficient single-family houses are calculated. The results indicate no general trend regarding the size of the respective technologies, although larger areas where PV-wind power complementarity enables lowering the total system costs and required storage capacities were determined. Assuming that the cluster of households could be constituted and depending on the location, the total installation and operation costs for the proposed systems for a lifetime of 20 years range between EUR 1.8 Million and EUR 5 Million without considering costs of financing. Regions with the lowest costs were identified mainly in the south of Germany.

To meet current targets for greenhouse gas emissions in Europe, emissions, especially those originating from the road transport sector, need to be reduced. Plans are to achieve this goal by substituting fossil fuel vehicles with electric vehicles (EVs). This article first discusses conceptually the impact of an increasing share of EVs on the electricity grid and suitable locations for charging stations with examples from a Case Study in Lower Bavaria. Secondly, the impact of purchase subsidies on EV purchases in Germany, a high-income country characterized by an important automotive industry and an increasing share of private vehicles is examined. To achieve this, yearly information on EV purchases were analyzed by applying the Synthetic Control Method. Combining data from different sources including the European Alternative Fuels Observatory, Eurostat, and the European Automobile Manufacturers' Association, an overall picture was developed. Results indicate a difference between private, semi-public, and public charging infrastructures. Its spatial distribution does not correspond to a specific development strategy. Moreover, EV subsidies have a limited effect in Germany when controlling for market size. Limiting the discussion to a trade-off between subsidizing infrastructures or EV purchases obviates the multidimensionality of the problem as neither of them may be sufficient to accelerate the transition per se. Furthermore, if electricity provided for EVs comes mainly from fossil carriers, the changes in the road transport sector will not yield the expected emission reductions. The transition towards renewables is directly intertwined with the effects of EVs on emission reductions in the road transport sector.

The energy transition towards high shares of renewables and the continued urbanization process have a direct and strong impact on the shape and characteristics of the electricity transmission and distribution systems. At the continental and national scale, improved high voltage grids should allow the transmission and balance of electricity from hot-spots of variable renewable energy generation installations to demand centres. At the regional and municipal scale, the medium and low voltage grids should be capable of bringing sufficient electricity to users and allow the integration of distributed renewable generation installations. While data on the transmission systems is widely available, spatial and attribute data of the medium and mainly the low voltage grids are scarce. Additionally, while there are plenty of studies on the requirements of the grid to allow the energy transition, there is very little information on the necessary transformation of the grid due to changes generated by the expected urbanization process. This study relies on a data set that estimates the topology of the medium and low voltage grids of Bavaria (Germany) as well as data from the LUISA territorial modelling platform of the European Commission to calculate key figures of grid requirements depending on population and land use for the current case and the decades to come. Typologies of grid requirements are proposed based on a statistical analysis of population and land use data of each square kilometre of the federal state. These typologies are extrapolated to changes in the structure of settlements that are expected in the years 2030 and 2050. Results are presented using maps with expected absolute values of grid requirements and their temporal changes for each square kilometre of the project area. Grid requirements are expected to increase in cities and to be reduced in most of the rural areas. The largest changes are expected to take place in the suburbs of the major cities. Highlights for public administration, management and planning: • Medium and low voltage grid shapes and lengths are estimated for the entire federal state of Bavaria, Germany. • On average, distribution grid length requirements per person are between 13 and 16 times larger in rural regions than in city centres. • While city centres and suburbs expect an increase in grid requirements, the total grid length of Bavaria is expected to decrease in the near future. • Suburbs of large cities are not only expected to change steadily but also to show the largest changes in grid length requirements until 2050.

While especially rural regions struggle to grow economically, startups – important drivers for regional economic growth – mainly settle in cities. Business founders usually start a firm where they live and only afterwards decide where to locate the business on a long‐term plan and on the basis of economic considerations (Feldman, 2001). Existing literature explains when and why startups usually move (Stam, 2007) but does not differentiate between rural or urban regional aspects. On the basis of a descriptive analysis of 6,550 German startups and several in‐depth interviews, this article discusses indicators that can support or inhibit the increasing settlement of specifically digital start‐ups in rural regions. Results show that nearly the same total number of digital startups move from urban to rural regions and vice versa. Further results raise the assumption that digital startups in particular are not as bound to local access to aspects such as customers or suppliers. Digitization could increase the potential for rural regions to become more competitive with urban regions than before.