Survey: Texas GOP support growing for clean energy

Faced with a slate of legislative bills to tighten clean-energy regulations in Texas, a group of state conservatives who support tapping renewable resources recently issued survey results showing that the nonprofit is in step with a majority of state Republicans.

The Texas legislature is down to three weeks to act on the bills before the lawmaking session is expected to end June 2. The legislative window is seen as a pivotal crossroads for the state, which now leads the nation in both solar deployment and manufacturing.

Some 64%  of Republican survey respondents reported having “a favorable image of renewable energy,” up four percentage points from 2023, while 18% had an unfavorable image, according to the fourth set of results from the poll since 2020 by Conservative Texans for Energy Innovation (CTEI). Democrats were at 83% favorability and 6% unfavorability, while independents stood at, respectively, 72% and 12%.

“With each passing year, more Texans are realizing that cleaner energy policies lead to greater customer choice, improved reliability, new technologies, and better pricing,” Matt Welch, CTEI state director, said in a statement accompanying the poll results.

“With our booming economy, burgeoning population, and increased energy demands from technology including data centers and AI, Texas must prepare for the future using every tool in our energy arsenal,” Welch was quoted as saying. “This latest data underscores that residents understand what is at stake.”

In this context, the GOP temperature reading matters most because party members decisively outnumber Democrats in both legislative chambers – 88-66 in the House of Representatives and 20-11 in the Senate. Moreover, most proposals to more strictly regulate renewable-energy projects in Texas have emanated from Republican legislative factions. CTEI is striving to influence those lawmakers.

Some of the provisions among the half-dozen most prominent bills would require state permits, environmental studies, public hearings and bigger setbacks for solar and wind projects; mandate that renewable energy facilities to provide backup power through gas plants or batteries; and direct that half of new electricity generation come for “dispatchable resources,” such as gas or coal.

For the first time in the polling series, a majority of Republican respondents said they believed clean energy would result in cheaper energy. Support for that proposition stood at 53%, up 10 percentage points from 43% in 2023. Independents were at 70%, up from 57%. Democrats held about even at 72%.

On the government front, 76% of Republicans supported “government action to accelerate clean energy,” up seven points from 69% in 2023; 88% of independents supported government action, up from 80%; and 93% of Democrats, up a tick from 92%.

The survey also explored attitudes towards renewable-energy developments by demographic, technology and regulation.

The poll found that 85% of respondents believed each that clean energy would help the economy by creating jobs and improve the reliability of the electrical grid. Republican belief in the economic reasons jumped 13 points to 81%, up from 68% in 2023, and in grid-reliability reasons rose seven points to 79%, up from 72%.

At 78%, Republicans also voiced concern China’s potential impact on energy security at the highest rate among the three major voter blocs. A total of 71% of all respondents said they were concerned about the China issue.

For the survey, CTEI tapped the national Republican polling firm Public Opinion Strategies to query 1,000 registered voters in Texas between March 22 and 30. The survey had a “credibility interval” of plus or minus 3.53%.

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