Essential Report
Government spending on energy sources
Q To what extent would you support or oppose the Government spending taxpayers’ money to research the following energy sources?
NET: Support | NET: Oppose | Strongly support | Somewhat support | Neither support nor oppose | Somewhat oppose | Strongly oppose | |
Renewables (such as large-scale solar or wind farms) | 71% | 12% | 45% | 27% | 16% | 7% | 5% |
Hydrogen technology | 57% | 10% | 24% | 33% | 32% | 7% | 3% |
Clean coal | 50% | 23% | 20% | 29% | 28% | 11% | 11% |
Nuclear | 38% | 35% | 17% | 21% | 27% | 15% | 20% |
Gender | Age Group | Federal Voting Intention | Location | ||||||||||
NET: Support | Total | Male | Female | 18-34 | 35-54 | 55+ | Labor | Coalition | Greens | NET: Other | Capital City | Non-Capital City | |
Renewables (such as large-
scale solar or wind farms) |
71% | 71% | 72% | 74% | 69% | 72% | 78% | 66% | 95% | 63% | 74% | 67% | |
Hydrogen technology | 57% | 65% | 51% | 53% | 52% | 66% | 58% | 61% | 63% | 54% | 59% | 53% | |
Clean coal | 50% | 50% | 50% | 49% | 44% | 56% | 43% | 64% | 28% | 48% | 51% | 47% | |
Nuclear | 38% | 47% | 30% | 32% | 34% | 47% | 34% | 50% | 25% | 37% | 39% | 36% |
- 71% of participants support the Government spending taxpayers’ money to research renewables, compared to 50% support for clean coal.
- Support for research into renewables is higher in capital cities (74%) than non-capital cities (67%), and higher among Greens voters (95%) than all other voters (63%).
- Coalition voters are most likely to support research into clean coal (64%) and nuclear power (50%) whereas Greens voters are least likely to support those energy sources (28% and 25% respectively).
- Men tend to support research into hydrogen technology (65%) and nuclear (47%) more than women (51% and 30% respectively).
- Participants over 55 years are more likely to support research into hydrogen technology (66%), clean coal (56%) or nuclear (47%) than those aged 18-54 (52%, 46% and 33% respectively).

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