The idea to constitute the Energy Institute Hrvoje Požar grew, in late 1993, out of the need for a nonprofit institute that would provide support to reform processes, government institutions and energy sector companies. The Institute was founded as a limited liability company in 1994 by a decision of the Croatian Electric Utility Company’s Supervisory Board. One of the founders of the Institute, along with Goran Granić, Ph.D. who became the Institute’s first director, was Ivo Hrs, Ph.D., an energy expert with great knowledge and experience. His untimely death has interrupted his fruitful research and scientific career as well as his contribution to the field of energy.

The Institute’s initial expert team consisted of researchers employed at the Institute for Energy and Electric Power Utility which were active in the scientific areas of power, energy system and network planning. These researchers followed the tradition of the so-called Zagreb (Croatian) Energy School which was founded in 1953 by academicians Hrvoje Poaar and, later, Boao Udovičić. A year later, in 1995, the Government of the Republic of Croatia (its Ministry of Science and Technology and Ministry of the Economy) and the Croatian Oil and Gas Company (INA) were added to the Institute’s founders with equal management rights. During 2002, the founding rights were transferred from the Croatian Electric Utility Company (HEP) and INA to the Government of the Republic of Croatia, which expanded the Institute’s mission to include expert and scientific support to the Croatian Energy Regulatory Council. In 2004 the Institute is transformed into a non-profit scientific institution owned by the Republic of Croatia.

The Institute’s first headquarters were located in HEP’s company building in Ulica grada Vukovara 37 in Zagreb. In the year 2000, the Institute’s headquarters were transferred to Savska cesta 163 in Zagreb, to a building specially reconstructed and equipped to enable the Institute to carry out its overall mission.