The aim of the article is to present international economic integration as one of the mega trends that infl uence on the redefi nition of the factors of socio-economic development. The research procedure includes three stages. In the fi rst stage, the most important modern mega trends of socio-economic changes are organized in a synthetic way. In the second step, the genesis and changes of the process of international economic integration are elaborated. In the third stage, the infl uence of international economic integration on the changes of factors of socio-economic development is systematized. This study is being carried out as part of the FORSED research project (http://www.forsed.amu.edu.pl) fi nanced by the National Science Center as part of OPUS competition 10 – 2015/19/B/HS5/00012: New challenges of regional policy in shaping the socio-economic development factors of less developed regions.

Nowadays, the ubiquity of changes determines a new approach to programming development. In this situation, it is necessary to update the strategy of socio-economic development in many cities. The aim of the paper is to present the process of updating the city’s development strategy on selected examples (Katowice, Cracow, Poznań, Warsaw and Wrocław), through the prism of the scale and tools of public participation. Wrocław is a centre that particularly approached the implementation of the megatrend of public participation in the work on updating the development strategy. The paper delineates differences between public consultations and real public participation. The following research methods were used in the study: literature research, analysis of source texts, benchmarking and comparative analysis. The time horizon covers the period of public participation in the documents’ construction and is different for particular cities selected for analysis, however, it falls in the years 2013-2017.

In order to meet global challenges, cities must be governed efficiently, be compact, and as a result more sustainable, socially coherent, strong and competitive at economic level. Initiatives taken in favour of urban mobility may help in shaping of the global society, putting the main focus on the quality of life, citizens› needs and the principle of sustainable development. These actions aim at focusing citizens› attention on the need to improve air quality, decrease congestion in city’s main streets, but most of all to invest in your own health and physical condition, which increases the level of citizens’ life conditions, and in turn provides the city with considerable economic benefits. However, is it quite a challenge to ensure a sustainable urban mobility pattern which requires a high level of stakeholders’ participation and establishing a detailed complex planning process. The aim of the paper is to present, based on the available literature and data sources and also survey research results, shaping life quality in the aspect of mobility in the context of current megatrends, taking as a case study the CIVITAS DYN@MO project implementation in the city of Gdynia.

This perspective paper focuses on the changes in teaching chemical engineering in Europe triggered by new challenges and megatrends observed in the chemical and related industries. Among the new teaching areas to address those challenges and megatrends, process intensification, digitalization and advanced materials are expected to play the most important role and are discussed in more detail. The discussion on incorporation of those new areas in the university curricula is illustrated with a comparison of educational approaches to the chemical engineering teaching at two universities – Delft University of Technology and Warsaw University of Technology. The aim of this paper is to focus the attention of university teachers and potential decision makers on the most important challenges for contemporary teaching of chemical engineering.

The second decade of the 21st century is a period of intense development of various types of energy storage other than pumped-storage hydroelectricity. Battery and thermal storage systems are particularly rapidly developing ones. The observed phenomenon is a result of a key megatrend, i.e. the development of intermittent renewable energy sources (IRES) (wind power, photovoltaics). The development of RES, mainly in the form of distributed generation, combined with the dynamic development of electric mobility, results in the need to stabilize the grid frequency and voltage and calls for new solutions in order to ensure the security of energy supplies. High maturity, appropriate technical parameters, and increasingly better economic parameters of lithium battery technology (including lithium-ion batteries) result in a rapid increase of the installed capacity of this type of energy storage. The abovementioned phenomena helped to raise the question about the prospects for the development of electricity storage in the world and in Poland in the 2030 horizon. The estimated worldwide battery energy storage capacity in 2030 is ca. 51.1 GW, while in the case of Poland it is approximately 410.6 MW.

Contemporary changes of socio-economic development factors. The aim of the work is to determine the scope of contemporary changes of socio-economic development factors, paying attention to the consequences for their interpretation and mechanism of impact relating to the regional and local level. The main goal is specified by formulating the following research questions: (1) What major megatrends shape contemporary developmental transformations? (2) What is the direction and scope of changes in socio-economic development factors? (3) How are the conditions of development processes changing as a result of these changes and how they differentiate the processes of development in space? The article is a synthesis of the results of two research projects of the National Science Center: NN 306 79 19 40: Socio-economic development and the development of areas of growth and areas of economic stagnation (2011–2014) and OPUS 10 – 2015/19/B/HS5/00012: New challenges of regional policy in shaping the factors of socio-economic development of less developed regions (2016–2019) and the results of own authors’ research – employees of the Regional Analysis Department at the Institute of Socio-Economic Geography and Spatial Management of the Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań.