Survey shows: Europeans still want to save on energy, even though their concerns about energy policy restrictions have actually increased compared to last year.
Sande, Germany, 8. September 2023 – A bill to phase out gas and oil heating, energy prices, and the lifetime of nuclear power plants… No other topic featured as many controversial discussions as saving energy did this year. Is it slowly becoming too much to bear for Europe? Quite the opposite! A survey by reichelt elektronik shows that consumers in Europe remain motivated to continue their energy saving measures.
Energy-saving fatigue? Not a trace of it!
About half of all Europeans (53%) have taken personal measures to save energy within the last 12 months – this marks a significant decrease compared to 87 percent of respondents taking energy-saving measures in the previous year. So, has Europe become tired of saving energy? A sweeping generalization like this might be ill-advised. 34 percent of those surveyed still say they are motivated to implement energy-saving measures again in the coming winter. And 72 percent would cut back just as much in the coming winter as they did last winter. The reason being that the methods work. 63 percent of Europeans were able to save energy, and by extension money, last winter through their energy-saving measures.
Saving energy: The current state of Europe
Most of the energy-saving measures that have already been implemented are easy to execute and do not cost much. Outfitting lamps and lighting fixtures with LEDs (45%), decreasing the temperature settings for rooms (37%), monitoring energy consumption more closely (30%) or switching to a cheaper supplier (29%) are the most frequently implemented methods. The more expensive or complex measures are implemented less frequently. For example, only 21 percent of households use solar power from they have generated themselves so far. And only 20 percent have introduced a smart home system to optimise energy consumption, even though 31 percent plan to do so in the near future.
Will heat pumps fall by the wayside?
The pattern of favouring cheap and less complex methods is also evident when it comes to changing from existing heating solutions to more modern ones. Only 19 percent of surveyed households have already installed a heat pump – and only 28 percent are planning on installing one. This makes heat pumps the least popular option for saving energy. Moreover, most Europeans do not see heat pumps as the first option at hand to reduce energy consumption. Insulation, replacing and sealing windows and doors, and a smart heating system seem more important to them.
But this does not mean that the advantages of heat pumps are not being recognised. For example, when respondents were asked “Which heating system do you consider the most efficient?”, heat pumps came in at first place with 23 percent, closely followed by solar-powered heating systems (22%), and district heating only convincing a tenth (10%). The biggest hurdles currently lie with budgets and the shortage of skilled labour. A little over a quarter of respondents (26%) currently cannot afford energy-saving measures such as the installation of a heat pump and 13 percent cannot find the skilled workers needed to implement some energy conversion measures.
Concerns about high energy prices are common
For the coming winter, people continue to be concerned about high energy prices. More than half (52%) fear that prices will rise to such a degree that they will have to cut back even further. This is eleven per cent more than compared to the results of autumn 2022. Almost a third (29%) are also worried about the political dimensions, which could affect the security of the energy supply or push prices even further. About a fifth (21%) fear the possibility of power outages.
Though one piece of good news is that compared to last year, fewer people are worried about not being able to afford their current home (down from 21% last year to 17% this year). Nevertheless, there are only 16% of Europeans who aren’t worried about the coming winter and two-thirds (67%) expect energy prices to increase further in the coming year.
What can people do?
So, what needs to happen to enable more people to save energy and feel safer? When it comes to larger investments, respondents often report having their hands tied because they themselves are not responsible for these decisions. For example, about a quarter (23%) say they cannot act because they do not own the building or cannot get permission. Therefore, many (38%) are interested in the possibilities of making small changes to their everyday life to conserve energy.
There is also high demand for information and education. For example, respondents would like to know how much money they can save through specific measures (36%) and which household appliances they should replace or use less (30%).
What people want most from the government are more concrete measures to reduce energy costs (46%) – followed by a faster expansion of renewable energies (28%) and longer operating times for nuclear power plants (19%).
“I can absolutely understand people’s concern about high energy prices,” says Jan Pakusa, Product Manager for Power Supplies and Test & Measurement at reichelt elektronik. “That’s why it’s a good approach to save energy through smaller measures that aren’t impossible to implement. However, this does not mean that people must make do without technologies like solar power. For example, there are many ways to install a balcony power plant at low cost and thus reduce the electricity bill sustainably.”
Images: Adobe Stock, reichelt elektronik
