Examining the Relationship between Renewable Energy and Environmental Awareness

Abstract

The use of green and renewable energies undeniably plays an essential role in today’s society. Energy from these sources plays a key role in transforming the energy sector and significantly impacts the way of life and the quality of life of different social groups. The main aspects of this study are to briefly describe the situation of clean and renewable energy in Hungary and to investigate the extent to which the younger generation of different social groups is involved in using renewable energy sources in their everyday lives and their attitudes towards environmental awareness. In our research, we also investigate whether there is a strong statistical correlation between environmental awareness, environmentally damaging activities and the perceptions of different environmental problems among the target groups and, if so, how these affect the research topic. Our primary research can be considered representative, as we surveyed all primary and secondary school students in the Gyöngyös micro-region of the North-Hungarian region and also included the opinion of university students in the mentioned micro-region. The questionnaire was asked in person, and 2180 students completed it. The research was carried out in several phases, the first occurring between 2017 and 2019 and the second between 2020 and 2021. Three research questions were formulated, and the main findings show that the students’ main goal in the research was not to protect or support the environment but to prefer material well-being and related factors. On the results of statistical correlation analyses, overall, the examination by educational level (primary, secondary and higher) does not show significant differences between student groups, i.e., students with higher education do not have higher levels of environmental awareness and attitudes. Another important finding is that using renewable energy sources is considered too expensive for low-income families to take advantage of this kind of energy.