Rising power costs ‘could leave us unable to pay energy bills’

Britons are overwhelmingly green-minded but are worried that rising energy costs could leave them unable to afford their electricity bills, a survey suggests.

Seventy-nine per cent of respondents to study by Cardiff University said they believed that the UK should reduce its reliance on fossil fuels, largely because of the environmental damage they could cause by accelerating climate change.

Between 70 per cent and 90 per cent of those surveyed said they had a “favourable opinion” of solar, wind, tidal and wave energy, depending on the technology.

Eighty-one per cent of participants wanted to reduce their energy use, again partly motivated by environmental concerns. However, 83 per cent of the 2,441 respondents said they were “fairly or very concerned that in the next 10 to 20 years electricity and gas will become unaffordable for them”.

Professor Nick Pidgeon, of Cardiff University, said: “I was surprised at how green people are. It’s a novel set of findings.”