All videos are accessible until 25.05.2023 (arte.tv)
Europe. Continent in upheaval
The digital challenge / Energy for all
Dating apps and delivery services, home offices and AI in the living room: our everyday lives are more digital than ever. At the same time, the sore points of global networking are emerging. Dependence on international tech giants is becoming a threat to European democracies. But the continent is gearing up. From the battle for control of our hidden continent: digital Europe.
Corona crises and lockdowns have disrupted people's lives in Europe. But they have also shown how important new technologies are. Home offices, online shopping, video conferencing and the widespread use of apps have become an integral part of everyday life. Nevertheless, Europe is lagging behind in digitization and is far behind the USA and China. The fragmented and isolated European market, lack of investment and dependence on the dominant American companies show that Europe still has some way to go in terms of digitization.
Yet Europe's digital sovereignty is more important today than ever. Some American online giants behave like independent sovereign territories - to the detriment of European citizens, who are helplessly at the mercy of fake news, precarious jobs and data theft.
Digital sovereignty is also important for the functioning of democracies and the security of European citizens and consumers. Today, it is among the European Union's top concerns, driven by European Commission Executive Vice President Margrethe Vestager.
Thanks to European investment, some countries have already taken steps in the right direction, such as Sweden with the world's largest audio streaming service, Spotify, and Estonia with the centralization and securing of all its IT services and data. But this is just the beginning. The battle against the dominant online giants is still a major challenge.
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Energy for all
Energy is life. Europeans are currently feeling this at first hand. For too long, our continent has been living off coal, oil and gas - imported from all over the world, leverage for geopolitical interests and drivers of climate change. Alternative solutions are essential for survival. But are national and local initiatives enough for a European energy transition?
Energy is vital and is a cause for concern today more than ever. The war in Ukraine has made it clear how dependent Europe is on fossil fuels. This weakens Europe and gives the often authoritarian exporting countries geopolitical leverage.
For some weeks now, the war on the European continent has been displacing the climate issue. In this context, the increasing consumption of environmentally harmful energy sources raises not only economic and political questions. Yet, despite everything, decarbonizing Europe has become a priority in many places, and alternative solutions already exist. In France, Denmark and Ukraine, citizens' initiatives are taking their energy supply into their own hands and investing collectively in the production of their own solar power, which is far more cost-effective than what is offered by national electricity providers. These initiatives show that decentralization of energy production could be a key to the necessary energy transition.
Poland, while still heavily dependent on coal, is organizing retraining programs for workers in the mining sector to switch to green jobs and move into wind power. By 2030, one million such green occupations will be created in Europe. Green hydrogen, which is currently still in the development phase, could also provide a sustainable and profitable solution for industry in the future.
Working solutions exist all over the continent. Not only the successive crises, but above all climate change makes it abundantly clear that urgent action is needed.