The Government surveys UK energy opinions every March, with three shorter surveys in June, September and December.
The trackers offer insights into UK energy issues among the public, providing fascinating glimpses into everyday understanding of energy. What do the latest numbers show?
The public’s views on energy
On energy security, levels of concern remain consistent with those a year ago, though they have decreased considerably since the last survey. Meanwhile, those of us who give genuine thought to saving energy remained very stable since last year.
On renewables and nuclear, renewables support has been consistently high, with 77% expressing support. The latest figures report 35% support nuclear energy with 21% opposed.
Elsewhere, relatively fewer people are worried about energy bills, and on suppliers and switching, numbers planning to switch energy supplier in the next year remained stable compared with last year.
Shale gas remains unpopular; 48% neither supported nor opposed it, but of those who did offer an opinion 33% opposed it, with 16% supportive.
The most common reason for supporting fracking was the need to use all available energy sources (42%).
Deeper insights
The proportion of people that like saving energy in the home remained very stable since last year. 23% claimed to give a lot of thought to saving energy at home, whilst half claimed to give it a fair amount of thought.
Worries over paying for energy bills have dropped to their lowest since the tracker began, with only 20% either very or fairly worried.
The level of worry was lowest among those with household incomes over £50,000 (12%), 16-24 year olds (13%) and social grade AB (14%). It was highest among social renters (27%), 45-54 year olds (27%) and those in social grade DE (26%).
On billing itself, we remain likely to trust suppliers to provide a bill which accurately reflects energy use (69%), and to provide a breakdown of the components of bills (70%).
The Energys opinion
“Energys welcomes every comprehensive UK energy survey; it’s essential to act on and understand data that shoes how consumers are reacting to energy issues,” says Kevin Cox, Managing Director, here at Energys Group.
“The Energys Group viewpoint remains that low carbon, energy efficient technology remains crucial to the UK’s energy futures. The megawatt that isn’t used is clearly the cheapest.
“If anything, we would like to see more questions on efficiency and low carbon. This would help spread awareness in addition to generating valuable insights.”
Click to find out more about Energys Group’s expertise in low carbon solutions.
