Poland has a large potential for biogas production from agricultural sources and food waste. This potential is still poorly used. There are many reasons for this state of affairs. We can indicate both the policy of the state towards renewable energy sources (RES) with a small amount of energy from biogas contracted at auctions, investment risk, and especially low return on investment in the absence of investment support. An important reason is also the limited state budget. The purpose of this work was to determine the endogenous factors that determine ROE, the direction of the impact of these factors, as well as the strategy of biogas plants in shaping the ROE level. The DuPont model was used in the analysis of ROE changes. We used the deviation method to determine the impact of the various factors on ROE. Against the background of the energy sector in Poland, the value of ROE in the examined biogas plants should be considered satisfactory, and in 2020 it was, on average, 13.9%. The decrease from 17.2% in 2019 occurred despite the increase in energy prices and the increase in the net profit margin (NPM). It resulted from the reduction of ROE’s financial leverage through external capital. A high level of debt characterized the examined biogas plants, and the pursuit of risk reduction and debt reduction negatively impacts on ROE. This may indicate the need for state investment support at the plant construction stage or low-interest investment loans to develop biogas plants. In addition, using only price guarantees under the feed-in tariffs, with dynamic changes in costs, may bring the industry a relatively high investment risk compared to other RES, where the operational costs during the lifetime are low, as it is in PV or wind systems.

Global discussion on energy security remains deeply embedded in social, political, and economic discourse, especially in light of ongoing geopolitical instability and disruptions in supply chains. The aim of this study is to assess the degree of differentiation in the energy security of EU countries and to distinguish typological groups of the studied facilities based on the level of this phenomenon in 2023. This article uses a three-stage research procedure to assess the energy security of EU countries. In the first stage, statistical data were collected for 21 diagnostic features belonging to three groups: energy production and consumption, energy imports and exports, and economic and social factors. Next, using the TOPSIS method, three synthetic measures were constructed: separately for each group of features, taking into account features from the first and second groups, and taking into account features from all three groups. Based on these measures, typological groups of countries were identified using the three-median method. In the final stage, the impact of socio-economic characteristics on energy security was assessed. The results presented in this paper confirm the varied level of energy security in EU countries and indicate that it is linked not only to categories directly related to the energy economy but also to the level of socio-economic development of a given country. The top places in the ranking are occupied by countries such as Sweden, Finland, the Netherlands and Austria, while the last places in the ranking include Malta, Greece, Cyprus and Ireland.

In the last decade, rapid technological development and a simultaneous increase in social awareness related to environmental protection have been determinants of the research and development of new techniques for generating energy from renewable sources. The international situation after 24 February 2022 in turn caused an increase in demand for energy that can be generated locally. This trend has not bypassed Poland either, where dynamic development of the market related to generating energy from renewable sources has been observed for many years. The aim of this article is to identify regularities in the degree of impact of the production and consumption of renewable energy on economic growth in Poland in 2005–2022. In this study, we used power econometric models. The results obtained by the authors show that energy consumption including renewable energy affects economic growth. In Poland, in the period under review, the increase in the consumption and production of energy from renewable sources, both on a national scale and on the scale of separate regions (city agglomerations, towns and suburbs, rural areas), contributed to the increase in measures characterizing economic development.

The article attempts to compare the living conditions of the population living in rural communities of West Pomeranian Voivodeship. The analysis used data for 159 indicators in the following areas of life: natural environment, demographics, social aspects, municipal infrastructure and housing, economic aspects, education and schooling, culture and tourism, and transport. The application of a multi-criteria taxonomy method allowed the author to take into account all the spheres of life altogether and to differentiate a group of voivodeships that are similar in terms of the examined phenomenon. On the basis of the conducted study it was found that Poland’s regions demonstrate a high degree of differences in terms of the objective quality of life.