YourOpinion Survey Results & News

AUSTRALIAN women hate nuclear power. Men don’t mind it, but women would rather use candles.

This is the startling finding of Auspoll’s latest research, a poll of 1500 Australians’ attitudes on energy generation. Australians were often divided along gender lines.

Overall, 36 per cent of Australians support uranium as an energy source and 44 per cent oppose it. Pretty even.

But digging deeper, just 19 per cent of women support it as an option for our future generating needs and a huge 59 per cent are against. By big contrast, 53 per cent of men are in favour. Why? I’ll leave that to the gender studies faculties. They get paid to take risks.

We agree much more about coal, which has provided almost all of our light, heat and Sunday roasts for many generations.

A substantial 42 per cent are against coal as part of our future mix compared to only 28 per cent for it. Another 30 per cent are undecided. Oil scores almost identical numbers. Both are starting to be seen as hangovers of a passing age, with less and less place in our future.

With power prices rising quickly, these are high-voltage issues for politicians. Somehow, they have to cope with growing anger about power bills, rising fears about the environment and deep community confusion and division.

If husbands and wives can’t agree, how on earth do governments shape coherent policy?

There’s only one safe harbour for politicians in this stormy sea of public opinion: So-called “green power”.

Support for the renewables is emphatic across the population. Nearly 90 per cent want wind generation to feature in our future and an extraordinary 93 per cent feel the same about solar. The number who disagree on solar is close enough to zero.

An interesting middle case is gas. It seems understood that gas generation has a fraction of the carbon impact of coal, although the very hard-line “anti fossil fuel” lobby is prone to reject it on the grounds it still emits some carbon. But that’s a minority view – 63 per cent favour its continued use, with only a paltry 12 per cent opposed.

Approving of something and realising its limitations are two different things. We asked how much of our growing demand for energy each fuel source could realistically meet.

A third of us think wind power could cover a large part of our needs and half think solar could. Our view of this technology is both approving and optimistic. Only a tiny 13 per cent agree that solar could only meet a small part of energy demand.

Digging into motivations, we asked respondents if each alternative was a good option for the environment.

Again, wind and sun scored in the 90s while coal and oil were booed off the stage. More people think gas is eco-friendly than don’t, while 30 per cent think nuclear could be a friend to biosphere, too (though not many women). But nearly half of people disagree. Must be those three-eyed fish in the river where Homer Simpson works.

So next time you flick the switch and fill your home with instant light, heat, clean laundry, television and home cooking, or next time you open your quarterly energy bill, don’t just take it for granted. Get worked up about it. Oh, I forgot. You already are.

Ross Neilson is Auspoll CEO

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/opinion/more-power-to-the-people-even-if-they-cannot-agree/story-e6frezz0-1225974638299