Nordic mythology & Iceland’s sustainable transformation [Website contribution]

This article advances the argument that renewable energy transitions are not solely technical or economic processes, but are also culturally and symbolically embedded transformations shaped by deeper societal narratives. Using Norse mythology as an interpretive framework, it repositions energy transitions as cyclical processes of destruction, renewal, and reconfiguration, drawing on the Poetic Edda and the symbolic triad of the Three Norns — Urðr, Verðandi, and Skuld—to foreground the temporal entanglement of past legacies, present governance, and future imaginaries in sustainability planning.

Building on this lens, Iceland is examined as a critical illustrative case of renewable energy-based transformation, where geothermal and wind energy systems are embedded within broader dynamics of institutional design, community participation, and regional socio-economic restructuring. Through selected empirical illustrations, the article demonstrates how energy enterprises simultaneously operate as technological infrastructures and socio-political actors shaping pathways of equity, resilience, and development.

The article contributes to sustainability transitions scholarship by introducing cultural mythology as an analytical entry point for interpreting energy systems, challenging narrowly technocratic accounts of transition. It argues that sustainable energy futures depend not only on innovation and policy design, but also on the narratives through which societies make sense of transformation and legitimise long-term change.