Kiruna has positioned itself as one of Europe’s most contemporary sites, where the green industrial transition, climate change in the Arctic, and deep-rooted cultural traditions intersect. This ambition is explicitly articulated in Kiruna’s application for the title of European Capital of Culture 2029, which presents the city as a place where industrial innovation, global mobility, and long-standing cultural landscapes coexist and generate new forms of cultural expression. For an industrial mining city, this claim is both bold and provocative, raising fundamental questions about how culture is defined, produced, and valued in a context dominated by large-scale economic interests. This thesis critically examines the tensions underlying Kiruna’s redevelopment, focusing on the relationship between industrial expansion—particularly mining—and the safeguarding of cultural heritage. Central to the analysis is the question of how heritage is perceived within processes of urban transformation: what forms of heritage are preserved, which are displaced or redefined, and on what grounds decisions about “sufficient” safeguarding are made. The study interrogates whether heritage protection is deemed adequate because of its intrinsic cultural value or because it aligns with economic, political, or institutional constraints. By analyzing the economic power of corporations over heritage narratives and practices, the thesis highlights broader challenges in managing heritage amid large-scale transformations driven by green transition agendas. Ultimately, it argues for a more careful and critical evaluation of how heritage is negotiated in redevelopment processes, emphasizing the need to scrutinize whose interests are served and what cultural futures are made possible—or foreclosed—in the name of progress.