Vineyards that reach the Baltic Sea? We’ve seen it once before – some 800 years ago. Today’s climate change is bringing warmer and warmer weather to Germany. And accordingly, German winemakers have started moving even further north, all the way to the coast. Near Kiel, Germany’s northernmost big city in the state of Schleswig-Holstein, the Montigny Winery now operates a vineyard on two hectares of land surrounding Hof Altmuehlen. And …

Daniel Stammler and Janosch Sadowksi came to Berlin by way of Karlsruhe, the city in southwest Germany where they founded Kolibri, their gaming startup. Stammler and Sadowski see the town as having been an ideal springboard for their business, especially thanks to its proximity to the Karlsruhe Institute for Technology (KIT) and all the creative minds studying there. “However, in order to take things to the next level, we had …

If the past few years have taught us anything, it’s the wisdom of taking predictions with a grain of salt. When Donald Trump was elected president of the United States, it was said the US economy would collapse. That has not happened. It has, in fact, grown at a healthy clip. In a similar vein, the argument went that if the British chose to leave the European Union, prices on …

If you want to build a building, you need construction machinery and industrial cranes. When the work of those excavators and wheel loaders is done and the building is standing erect, the machines are taken back to the depot. In fact, a large portion of building equipment is active on construction sites for only 50 percent of its “lifetime.” In the case of cranes, that number sinks to only 25 …

In the dispute over the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, German Minister for Economic Affairs and Energy Peter Altmaier is openly seeking a compromise with the United States. The German government will ensure that there is a liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal in Germany, he said. American LNG – albeit expensive – could then be brought into the country. Europe cannot be “susceptible to blackmail,” Altmaier said on Feb. 13 …

Ole Wald* has mixed feelings looking back at his years as a United States citizen. “It hurts my heart that I’m no longer an American,” says the 54-year-old Berlin-based co-founder of an industrial real estate development firm. “Being a US citizen has been part of my identity forever.” On the other hand, he’s relieved to be rid of his American passport. “It would have been much more difficult to cut …

For Cecilia Malmström, it was an unpleasant yet necessary task.

On Jan. 19, as the Swedish-born European Commissioner for Trade was presenting her draft mandate for new negotiations with the United States in Brussels, she visibly sought to not raise expectations. “This is not a traditional, comprehensive trade agreement,” Malmström explained. She also stated that there would be no revival of the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), that controversial …

It’s an ambitious goal: By 2022, Germany will close its last nuclear power plant and, only 16 years later, stop burning coal altogether. Too slow or too ambitious? It’s a hot debate in Germany, at the moment. Nevertheless, the federal government plans to follow the recommendations of the so-called Coal Commission, and to codify it in law by May. It will also stipulate which regions and companies directly affected by …

The focus has shifted in debates over the security of energy supplies. While the secure supply of energy sources (coal, petroleum and natural gas) was once the central theme and will remain necessary for some time, of even greater importance are sustainability and climate compatibility. Headlines touting decisions by the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries have been replaced by those citing international climate conferences and their declarations on decarbonizing the …

German CEOs tend to get nervous when confronted with legal problems in the United States. To be sure, class action lawsuits are often associated with major financial costs. This is exactly what Volkswagen found out when the diesel scandal broke. While there is much criticism of class action suits, primarily regarding the large sums involved in litigation, there have been growing calls in Germany for more consumer rights in the …