Abstract

By maximizing their utility as a decision-making factor in free-market transactions, consumers prioritize "cheapness" and acceptable quality. The low price of an industrial product, however, resulted for many years from the fact that the product's life cycle costs, including its negative impact on the environment, were not included in its price. The environment understood and valued in correlation with the quality of life and human health. Each product deprives the environment of a part of natural resources or degrades them, and the population exposed to the negative impact of its production process takes away a part of health or life. Is it conceivable for an entrepreneur to voluntarily pay compensation for the fact that he burns fuels, generates sewage and waste, bearing in mind the expectation of "cheapness" and competition? This failure of the "unfettered market" in the protection of human rights to live in a clean environment was noticed already in the 20th century by mainstream economists who pointed to the need to internalize the problem of the cost of externalities. Disputes between the liberal Austrian school and the supporters of Keynesianism regarding state intervention in the market in the case of internalisation of the costs of using the environment have been resolved in most developed countries in favor of the latter through normative state intervention in the market and the introduction of appropriate taxes and fees for the use of the environment. Externalities have been defined by economists Pigou and Coase. The article presents an assessment of the effectiveness of the implemented normative acts in the country and in the European Union implementing the idea of internalization of external costs of negative environmental impact on the example of the energy market. It
presents the advantages and disadvantages of applying the above theories in practice, including in the EU climate policy, and whether they fulfill the function of protecting his rights for a statistical Pole, a citizen of the Union, and the balance of costs and benefi ts expressed in the price of energy meets the postulate of maximizing utility.