Croatia can quickly meet all its electricity needs from renewable energy sources, and we can also become a significant exporter. This is one of the conclusions from the presentation by Goran Krajačić, associate professor at the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering and Naval Architecture in Zagreb, held at the Lider conference “The Energy Future of Croatia.” The presentation was titled “Croatia’s Energy Transition: Trapped in the Past or on the Brink of a Bright Future,” and Krajačić illustrated how this entrapment in the past looks through the example of dependence on gas.
He referred to the spatial plan for the island of Lastovo, which was adopted relatively recently, in 2020. Among other things, it states that gasification of Lastovo is planned.
– If the island of Jabuka had a spatial plan, perhaps gasification would be mentioned in it – Krajačić said.
However, our past was once much brighter, considering that the Krka hydroelectric power plant was put into operation in the 19th century, making us pioneers in the development of power systems.
Europe has announced that it will become a climate-neutral continent by 2050, and some member states have already made significant progress towards this goal. For example, Denmark has fully decarbonized its thermal energy production and has built noticeable industrial capacities on this basis. Denmark has jumped from 11th place in Europe in terms of the share of renewable energy sources in 2004 to fourth place in 2022. At the same time, Croatia has fallen from fourth to ninth place, Krajačić pointed out.
In his opinion, we are still on the right path in producing green energy, but there has been no progress in building transport capacities and heating and cooling. The European RePower plan envisions that the old continent will have 600 MW of capacity in solar power plants and 500 GW in wind power plants. If this were to be reflected in Croatia, we should have five GW in solar and about four GW in wind power plants. If we add production from geothermal power plants and cogeneration plants, Croatia can produce a total of 23 TWh of electricity from renewable energy sources.
