In 2019, acting stakeholders from Hoyerswerda – citizens, business, science and education – supported by the city, joined together to form a strong alliance and create the strategy “LebensEnergieStadt”. As an alliance, they initiate the implementation of future-oriented development fields, bundle their diverse competences and develop a sustainable, liveable and citizen-oriented Smart City Hoyerswerda in a long-term and comprehensive restructuring and structural development process.
The strategic focus is on location development in the priority areas of energy, innovative affordable construction and housing, and health, and how to provide the necessary infrastructural conditions (energy, communication, education) as a basis for the economic activities to be further developed.
“LebensEnergieStadt” has all the potential, experience and opportunities to play a decisive pioneering role with national and international reach within the Lusatian model region for coal phase-out and climate protection. Behind this is an interdisciplinary process that involves a large number of actors and creates new networks. Together with the urban society, work is being done step by step to successfully implement the structural change. The “LebensEnergieStadt” is a vision and strategy with firmly anchored projects.
In the course of developing the strategy, more than 20 project ideas in six priority thematic areas were already outlined in 2019. Thanks to this preliminary work, it was possible to react quickly to the new funding opportunities made available by the state, federal government and EU from 2020 in the course of structural change. Hoyerswerda was able to submit a large number of projects through the “LebensEnergieStadt” and take on a pioneering role in the region. A first project has already been implemented with the Zeißig waterworks.
The “LebensEnergieStadt” was an important starting signal and has already been able to set important impulses in Hoyerswerda’s structural change process.