Cost of Transition to Renewable Sources of Energy and Support for Green Energy Transition in Croatia

Transition to renewable energy in Europe is a process that is largely driven by a set of broader EU policy initiatives and programs, but its implementation takes place in the context of the political economy of individual member states where national economic structure and policies interact to produce different coalitions supporting or opposing measures aimed at phasing out hydrocarbon powered industries and energy generation and introducing renewable sources of energy. How public opinion within an individual country react to energy transition depends on the structure of its political economy and costs and benefits that particular socioeconomic groups would have the bear in the process. This in turn depends on the size and employment respectively in the industrial sector that relies on hydrocarbon for energy and raw materials; in coal, oil and gas producing sector, and in coal, oil or gas dependent energy sector. The larger is the share of these sectors in the economy the larger is the share of the population that would likely face significant economic costs of energy transition. In addition, the public attitudes toward energy transition would depend on direct costs that individual citizens would have to face as consumers and on policies that would lower on increase these costs. Finally, citizens attitudes towards energy transition are likely to depend on their trust in the political system in broader sense and on social and economic attitudes or ideologies, as well as views about climate change and its causes. The paper analyses citizens support for energy transition and perception of costs and benefits that transition to green energy brings in Croatia, where the impact of national political economy should be less pronounced. Given that Croatia does not have oil, gas or coal producing sector, that it does not have significant industries dependent on fossil fuels and that it has plenty of natural potential for wind, solar, hydro, and geothermal energy production, the country should not have significant economic constituencies that would oppose energy transition. Thus, citizens attitudes toward transition to green energy in Croatia would depend predominantly on their actual or perceived direct costs and benefits as consumers, which are highly dependent on their socioeconomic position and government policies that may decrease or increase these costs, in addition to other individual level factors mentioned above. The paper uses survey data collected specifically for the purpose of analyzing attitudes towards the environment and energy transition. The paper aims to investigate how citizens view energy transition and how their socioeconomic position, perception of cost and benefits and impact of government policies shape their attitudes on energy transition and climate change in general and on specific policies supporting energy transition in particular. The analysis also controls for the impact of ideology, social and economic attitudes.