With the current emissions and disasters due to climate change, the energy transition towards a sustainable and climate resilient future of Northwest Europe is now more important than ever. The fi rst steps have been made, but this transition is happening too slow and in an insufficient and uncollaborative manner. This research studies the spatial implications of the energy transition and aims to construct a framework that helps to accelerate the process and make it more efficient and socially just. The methods used for this are data analysis and research by design, combined with scenario building, by investigating and designing the case study of the province of South-Holland within the context frame of Northwest Europe. The results of this report show an integrated spatial vision on the energy transition on multiple scales. Additionally, it provides a strategic framework that consists of policies, organizational structures and physical interventions, both in space and time, that are structured in a catalog. This proposal helps accelerate the process of the energy transition, to be able to build on a sustainable future for energy production and distribution

Global trends in urbanization, industrialization, and intensive agriculture are harming our (local) environment. These activities require significant mounts of resources, energy, and transportation, whilst creating increased waste streams. Poor management of these sites has led to severe soil, water, and air contamination. Currently, Europe has 2.8 million potentially soil-contaminated sites, with around 340,000 in direct need of remediation. Additionally, these activities cause land cover changes, shrinking and fragmenting the natural landscape. The decreased ecosystem connectivity is harmful to ecological processes and biodiversity. Phytoremediation and green infrastructure (GI) planning offer robust nature-based solutions to these problems. Integrating these solutions holds the potential to utilize the same vegetation for both solutions. However, integration of these solutions is challenging due to the scalar gap between the locality of phytotechnologies and the regional scale that is used for GI planning. This thesis presents a systematic approach to integrating small-scale phytoremediation interventions within regional-scale GI planning. Using a multi-scalar, data-driven framework, this research uses computational simulations, calculations, and assessments to identify optimal design solutions, including traditional GIS mapping, graph-theoretic networks, and neural networks. This integrated approach aims to enhance environmental remediation and ecosystem connectivity and provides a comprehensive strategy for sustainable regional planning.