To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, if she will publish a disaggregation of the figure relating to the popularity of renewable energy amongst the public, with a breakdown of individual renewable energy technologies from her Department's Public Attitudes Tracker - Wave 14 document.
This answer is the replacement for a previous holding answer.
Answered on
21 September 2015
Wave 14 of the Public Attitudes Tracker reveals that 75% of participants support the use of renewable energy to provide electricity, fuel and heat to the UK, 20% neither support nor oppose its use, and 4% oppose it.
The questions on individual renewable energy technologies were not included as part of the wave 14 survey, and will now feature bi-annually. This change is part of a wider review of the Public Attitudes Tracker, which commenced at the beginning of 2015, with the aim to ensure existing questions continue to add value and to increase capacity for additional topical questions going forward.
As three years’ worth of data reveals no clear pattern of change, DECC considered that understanding public attitudes to renewable technologies would not be hampered by reducing the frequency. Similar decisions were taken for the more frequent questions on energy saving and wasting, and energy security. The specific renewable questions will feature again in the next wave to be published on 10th November.