Dear Reader,

The Mol-Dessel-Geel nuclear zone is a Belgian region near the Dutch border, defined by a large power plant in visible decline. In "The Cloud Factory," Belgian writer and poet Charlotte van den Broek looks at what happens to a region marked by a constant concern for nuclear safety, and how that shapes the lives of those within it.

Energy—how to procure, how to source it, what to do without it—is one of the defining issues of our era.

With this issue, we aim to send you stories about energy and its delivery that aren't being told elsewhere. From Enerhodar, a city in Southeastern Ukraine, we present two accounts of life next to the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant, the largest nuclear power plant in Europe, which is currently under Russian occupation.

In Berlin, Jessi Jezewska Stevens takes the literary temperature at the state-funded Literaturhäuser, where everything is in crisis, especially literature itself.

We're kicking off with these three stories from Europe, and then expanding our global scope throughout the month with stories from Guyana and Argentina, poems from China and more. Look out for these over the month of March.

Thank you for reading The Dial!

— Madeleine, Linda and the Dial team