Green innovations aim to improve and reduce the environmental impact of economic activities. Thus far, research focus on the positive trajectories of green transition. Continuing in this direction we focus on brown regions (i.e. specialized in fossil-fuel technologies) and the challenges that they face to become sustainable. Taking as example German Labour Market Regions we identify brown regions and measure their transition using an innovative approach based on Social Network Analysis and Knowledge Spaces. We find that the technological relatedness to green technologies, having a high life satisfaction in the region and the presence of the green party in the local government facilitate the transition. However, strong economic structures based on brown activities do not generally increase the transition speed. Our findings imply that technological and socio-economic characteristics influence the speed of transition, a dimension not yet accounted for in the sustainability transition literature.

中文翻译：

---

加速棕色地区的可持续转型：释放速度因素


绿色创新旨在改善和减少经济活动对环境的影响。迄今为止，研究重点是绿色转型的积极轨迹。继续朝这个方向发展，我们重点关注棕色地区（即专门从事化石燃料技术的地区）及其在实现可持续发展方面面临的挑战。以德国劳动力市场区域为例，我们识别棕色区域并使用基于社交网络分析和知识空间的创新方法来衡量其转变。我们发现，技术与绿色技术的相关性、该地区的高生活满意度以及当地政府中绿党的存在促进了这种转变。然而，基于棕色活动的强大经济结构通常不会提高转型速度。我们的研究结果表明，技术和社会经济特征影响转型速度，这是可持续转型文献中尚未考虑的一个维度。