Energy industry: Price is the most important energy policy goal for Finns

Finns set the reasonableness of the energy price as the most important goal in the energy policy, according to the commission of the Energy Industry from the survey. Almost half set the price as either the most important or the second most important goal.

The next place was increasing energy self-sufficiency, and the third most important was reducing emissions and curbing climate change.

More and more people disagreed, at least somewhat, when asked about their willingness to pay more for energy because of the climate.

“Citizens already assume that energy is clean, so they don’t want to pay more for it. Saving electricity in one’s everyday life is no longer a climate change,” said the CEO of Energy Industry Jukka Leskelä in the bulletin.

According to Leskelä, this shows the effects of the energy crisis, which raised concerns about energy sufficiency and sometimes raised prices to very high levels.

Energy among the forms of production, solar power emerges as the most popular, which 82 percent of respondents considered a good target to increase. The popularity of nuclear power, hydropower and wind power has decreased compared to last year, but they were also still supported by a clear majority of respondents.

The popularity of nuclear power has fallen from the record level of the energy crisis to the pre-crisis figures, but support is more evenly distributed among different background groups than before. In a new survey, supporters of all parliamentary parties viewed nuclear power positively. As usual, men supported nuclear power more enthusiastically than women. 70 percent of the male respondents wanted more nuclear power, while 33 percent of the women were of the same opinion.

Most of the respondents had heard about small nuclear power plants, the construction of which is being investigated in various parts of Finland. Almost 70 percent of the respondents were either very or fairly positive about their introduction in Finland.

Power regarding transmission prices, the majority of respondents considered that moderate increases in transmission prices are acceptable, as long as supply reliability can be improved and power outages reduced. Almost a quarter of the respondents thought that the power outage should last no more than half an hour.

“Power outages have decreased and shortened over the past decade due to the investments made in networks. There is strong public support for the continuation of investments, whether it is to improve security of supply, or to promote a green transition through electrification,” said the Energy Industry’s electricity network expert Ina Lehto in the bulletin.

The survey was carried out by Iro Research and more than a thousand people responded to it in October. The margin of error for the entire material is a maximum of 2.8 percentage points in each direction.