Did the SARS-CoV-2 (Covid-19) coronavirus pandemic potentially increase opportunities to accelerate processes of pro-climate and pro-environmental transformation of the economy, but unfortunately these opportunities were not taken advantage of?

During the 1st wave of the SARS-CoV-2 (Covid-19) coronavirus pandemic in March 2020, the stock markets crashed. Energy and industrial commodities fell sharply on the commodity exchanges. A stock market crash also occurred on the stock markets. The main factor in the panic on the capital markets was the declaration of a global coronavirus epidemic, or pandemic state, by the World Health Organisation on 8 March 2020. This new term 'pandemic' itself created fear and uncertainty in the context of financial markets and economic processes. During the SARS-CoV-2 (Covid-19) coronavirus pandemic, there were also disruptions to international supply and supply logistics chains, government imposed quarantines and lockdowns imposed on selected sectors of the economy which increased the scale of the 2020 recession. As a result of these mainly interventionist actions by central institutions, a deep economic crisis emerged in 2020, the economy declined in many sectors of the economy, and economic process activity declined. The result of the decline in economic activity was a decrease in demand for raw materials, including energy raw materials. Due to the increase in remote working by employees of many companies from home, the use of cars, especially combustion cars, decreased. As a result, air quality and the state of the environment noticeably improved in 2020. In addition, opportunities have arisen to accelerate pro-climate transformation processes in the economy. Unfortunately, in many countries these opportunities have not been seized. For example, in the country where I operate during the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus pandemic (Covid-19), the government used printed money to provide financial public assistance to companies and enterprises operating in a wide variety of industries and sectors, not just those in lockdowns, on a historically record scale. Many companies and enterprises that were in good financial standing also benefited from these programmes of non-refundable financial subsidies, employee wage subsidies, tax relief, deferrals of contributions to the social security system and so on. The scale of the granted non-refundable public aid realised on the basis of printed money introduced extra-budgetarily by government funds created especially for this purpose was so large that inflation began to rise in Poland almost from the beginning of 2021. Citizens invested the extra, free money in shares and flats, which caused an increase in the prices of these assets. On the other hand, opportunities to accelerate the processes of pro-climate transformation of the economy were missed by the government. Subsidies for the development of renewable energy sources were not increased and were even reduced on some issues. Since April 2022, the government has reduced subsidies and worsened the economic conditions for the installation of photovoltaic panels by citizens on the roofs of their houses. There is a lack of subsidies for insulating the facades of buildings and single-family houses, installing photovoltaics, installing heat pumps and other renewable energy solutions. Poland has still not met the European Union guidelines for receiving EU subsidies to finance projects that could be implemented under the National Reconstruction Programme. As a result, the development of renewable and emission-free energy sources has slowed down instead of accelerating as it could have done during the pandemic. Unfortunately, still the process of pro-environmental and pro-climate transformation of the energy sector is progressing much slower than it could if the issue of green transformation of the economy was not ignored in the political and business spheres in Poland. The result of these omissions, neglect and ignorance is the current low level of energy independence and security in Poland in the context of the currently developing energy crisis. The result of this neglect is also the poor air quality in Poland. Poland has one of the worst air quality in the world. Poland is one of the 3 countries in Europe with the highest mortality rate caused by poor air quality polluted with various toxins resulting mainly from the dominant dirty energy industry based on burning fossil fuels. In addition, even more negative consequences of these omissions, negligence and ignorance appear in the future, when the process of global warming will significantly accelerate in the next decades and lead to a worsening of the climate crisis and to a climate catastrophe, which may already occur at the end of this 21st century.

The potential for accelerating the processes of pro-climate transformation of the economy that occurred during the SARS-CoV-2 (Covid-19) coronavirus pandemic was described in my publications, which I posted on my profile of this Research Gate portal after publication:

Article The Key Security Problems Related to the Pro-Environmental E...

Article The Post-Pandemic Development of the Green Circular Economy ...

Article The Impact of the SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19) Coronavirus Pandemic...

What does it look like in your country?

Did the SARS-CoV-2 (Covid-19) coronavirus pandemic potentially increase opportunities to accelerate processes of pro-climate and pro-environmental transformation of the economy, but unfortunately these opportunities were not used?

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Dariusz Prokopowicz