New polling in Victoria’s traditional energy basin has shown most regional and rural people would not want to pay “a single extra dollar” on their annual energy bill to make the transition to renewable energy faster as bills continue to bite.
As rising gas and electricity prices continue to hurt households and businesses, the polling in the Gippsland region, commissioned by Affordable Energy Australia, has found 67 per cent of consumers would not want to pay even a dollar more on their annual energy bill to fast track the transition.
The consumers said the energy transition was happening too quickly and they would prefer reliable and affordable energy instead of carbon cuts.
More than 50 per cent of those polled across the Gippsland, Bass and Pakenham districts said keeping household and small business electricity bills affordable should be the single most important priority for Victoria’s energy system.
Keeping the electricity system reliable was ranked the second most important priority and reducing emissions was the third priority.
With 93 per cent of respondents concerned about the cost of their electricity and gas bills,
only 13 per cent of those surveyed said they were willing to pay up to $50 per year more for a faster transition and another 13 per cent were willing to accept more than $50 on annual bills if it meant moving rapidly to carbon cut targets.
Gippsland, as the region bearing the brunt of the move from coal baseload generation, is seen as an epicentre testing ground for attitudes on energy transition.
Coal-fired stations Yallourn and Loy Yang A are scheduled to close in 2028 and 2035 respectively, with a major flow-on impact to jobs in the region as the Carroll government places heavy reliance specifically on offshore wind farms to fill the gaps.
There are legislated targets of 2GW by 2032, 4GW by 2035 and 9GW by 2040, despite ongoing environmental, regulatory and investment delays in the sea-based rollout.
Star of the South, Australia’s most advanced offshore wind project — with a transmission route from the Gippsland coast into the Latrobe Valley — is set to start construction around 2030 and begin power generation from 2032, with more generation being brought online progressively after that.
“The message is clear, Gippsland wants affordable power. Victoria’s energy system must serve consumers, not government targets,” AEA spokesperson Zoe Hilton said.
“The government has repeatedly told Victorians that replacing Yallourn and Loy Yang with wind and solar will make bills cheaper.
“But the cost of delivering the government’s offshore wind targets seriously calls that claim into question.
“Any policy that makes power more expensive will lose support from the Gippsland community, which is bearing the brunt of the energy transition.”
Ms Hilton said while polling had consistently shown people support energy transition towards more renewables “in theory”, they don’t support higher bills or imposition of large-scale wind and solar on regional communities.
“Consumers want cheap and reliable power first and foremost.
“They don’t want ideological targets being the end goal of their energy system.”
New polling in Victoria’s traditional energy basin has shown most regional and rural people would not want to pay “a single extra dollar” on their annual energy bill to make the transition to renewable energy faster as bills continue to bite.
As rising gas and electricity prices continue to hurt households and businesses, the polling in the Gippsland region, commissioned by Affordable Energy Australia, has found 67 per cent of consumers would not want to pay even a dollar more on their annual energy bill to fast track the transition.
The consumers said the energy transition was happening too quickly and they would prefer reliable and affordable energy instead of carbon cuts.
More than 50 per cent of those polled across the Gippsland, Bass and Pakenham districts said keeping household and small business electricity bills affordable should be the single most important priority for Victoria’s energy system.
Keeping the electricity system reliable was ranked the second most important priority and reducing emissions was the third priority.
With 93 per cent of respondents concerned about the cost of their electricity and gas bills,
only 13 per cent of those surveyed said they were willing to pay up to $50 per year more for a faster transition and another 13 per cent were willing to accept more than $50 on annual bills if it meant moving rapidly to carbon cut targets.
Gippsland, as the region bearing the brunt of the move from coal baseload generation, is seen as an epicentre testing ground for attitudes on energy transition.
Coal-fired stations Yallourn and Loy Yang A are scheduled to close in 2028 and 2035 respectively, with a major flow-on impact to jobs in the region as the Carroll government places heavy reliance specifically on offshore wind farms to fill the gaps.
There are legislated targets of 2GW by 2032, 4GW by 2035 and 9GW by 2040, despite ongoing environmental, regulatory and investment delays in the sea-based rollout.
Star of the South, Australia’s most advanced offshore wind project — with a transmission route from the Gippsland coast into the Latrobe Valley — is set to start construction around 2030 and begin power generation from 2032, with more generation being brought online progressively after that.
“The message is clear, Gippsland wants affordable power. Victoria’s energy system must serve consumers, not government targets,” AEA spokesperson Zoe Hilton said.
“The government has repeatedly told Victorians that replacing Yallourn and Loy Yang with wind and solar will make bills cheaper.
“But the cost of delivering the government’s offshore wind targets seriously calls that claim into question.
“Any policy that makes power more expensive will lose support from the Gippsland community, which is bearing the brunt of the energy transition.”
Ms Hilton said while polling had consistently shown people support energy transition towards more renewables “in theory”, they don’t support higher bills or imposition of large-scale wind and solar on regional communities.
“Consumers want cheap and reliable power first and foremost.
“They don’t want ideological targets being the end goal of their energy system.”
The survey polled 511 people.