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This research addresses local governance for building energy efficiency. In order to turn an increasingly proactive environmental policy agenda at subnational levels into practice, local governments experiment with new forms of governance. One important policy area in this regard is building energy use, often addressed through urban development projects. Such initiatives provide important insight into the role that local governments may play in terms of pushing developers from mainstream building practices towards the uptake of more radical energy efficient solutions by enabling socio‐technical translation. The analysis is based on two case studies from Sweden and Denmark, where the local governments have actively sought to challenge mainstream building practices through a combination of different modes of governing. It is shown how this combination of different modes of governing at the local level provides several translation entries for local governments seeking to foster sustainability transitions. The article concludes that more attention should be directed towards translation as part of the practical environmental governing at the local level. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment

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Consumer-oriented environmental policies came high on the political agenda during the 1990s. Internationally, consumers were assigned a key role in environmental policies; also in Denmark, political initiatives were taken to promote sustainable consumer behaviour. In this article, the results of Danish policies related to consumption and environment are assessed by considering first, the environmental impacts of the political measures, and second, whether the policies have succeeded in addressing the dynamics behind increasing consumption. The study combines a theoretical understanding of consumption as an inseparable part of daily practices with empirical analyses of three fields of consumption: housing, transportation, and information and communication technology. It is pointed out that policies to promote sustainable consumption are successful only when technological development, economic structures, and information are all in accordance with each other, and this is the case only when sustainable consumption does not conflict with economic growth. A more fundamental critique thus concerns the failure of Danish consumer-oriented environmental policies to address consumption growth and the rising standards for “normal consumption.” Copyright Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2007Consumer-oriented environmental policy, Sustainable consumption, Housing, Transport, Information and communication technology, Denmark,