Estimation and Forecasts for the Share of Renewable Energy Consumption in Final Energy Consumption by 2020 in the European Union

European Union Directive 2009/28/EC established that the share of renewable energy in the final energy consumption should reach a target of 20% by 2020 in European Union (EU) countries. This study analyses the tendency of this share using data for EU 28, taken from the Eurostat database for the period 1995–2016. First, after a brief statistical and economic analysis of the three macroeconomic indicators at EU level, five regression models (polynomial, ARIMA) were used to estimate the evolution of the share of renewable energy consumption into the final energy consumption, all of them showing an increasing trend for this indicator. The positive impact of the EU Directive in increasing this share was proved by means of a perturbed regression model. Forecasts of this share for the 2020 horizon were obtained, all showing that the EU target is yet to be reached. Secondly, four groups of EU-countries were considered, according to the final energy consumption. Empirical estimations of renewable energy share into the final energy consumption showed increasing trend for all groups, while providing forecasts quite different from the EU ones. Also, economic interpretations of the results are performed.