Resilient and Expansive Economies of the European Union in the Context of the Energy Policy

The European Union's goals of energy policy have been allocated to particular economies according to their economic, political, and institutional conditions. The national strategies of the member states are heading towards these goals. The research presented in this paper compares the effectiveness of the national energy policies with the ecological footprint of the member state economies. The advances measured by the key indicators of energy policy 2020 have been compiled for comparison with the biocapacity of the economies. It is aimed at showing the sustainability of the economies and the effectiveness of these strategies. The research identified four groups of countries distinguished by the criterion of their policy resiliency and sustainability. Resiliency is understood as an energy policy which balances energy flows in an economy without increasing ecological deficit. Sustainability defines countries with demand for energy within an ecological limit of an economy. The most expansive economies increased their ecological deficit, regardless of the advances in some areas of their national energy strategies. Nevertheless, the success of the European Union is mostly defined by the economies which are decreasing their ecological deficit compared to their levels in 1990. However, most of the economies are still on the way to sustainability.