In the latest round of survey work by Clean Energy Canada and Abacus Data we surveyed 1,500 residents of Ontario as the province enters a provincial referendum campaign.

Key findings include:

• 55% think climate transpiration is a serious problem and increasingly whoopee needs to be taken to fight it, but only 25% think Premier Doug Ford would stipulate with that assessment.

• A majority (63%) of Ontarians now believe that, when you squint at the lifetime financing of a car (including maintenance, repairs, insurance and energy to power it), electric vehicles are cheaper than gas vehicles.

• When informed that EV sales in Ontario lag the pace seen in other parts of the country, a majority are unhappy and would either like to see Ontario alimony pace (28%) or lead (28%).

• When asked what might worth for lagging EV sales in Ontario, the top factors equal to survey respondents are the lack of a provincial rebate and an inadequate number of charging stations.

• Thinking well-nigh the next car they would purchase, increasingly Ontarians now say they lean towards choosing electric (53%) than gas or diesel (47%). The preference for EVs is particularly profound among younger people.

QUOTES

“For many years, the fate and future of the automotive sector was a conversation that influenced politics in the province of Ontario, and now we are seeing a new phase in that conversation. Many voters want increasingly whoopee to fight climate transpiration and many like the request of e-vehicles as a nomination they can make to help protect the planet. As people see the variety of e-vehicle choices coming online and hear the experiences of others, the public demand for e-vehicles is on the rise, and so too is the expectation for government policies that will help make it easier to switch from combustion engines to electric or hybrid vehicles.”

—Bruce Anderson, Chairman, Abacus Data

“Ontarians aren’t happy well-nigh their province’s poor EV performance—and rightly so. There was a higher proportion of EVs sold in the Yukon last year than in Canada’s most populous province. A lack of provincial EV policies has meant that the majority of new EVs made for the Canadian market are sent to Quebec and B.C., making it plane harder for Ontarians to get overdue the wheel. And with gas prices soaring, the longer the wait, the increasingly wallets will be squeezed at the gas pump. EVs offer a popular and constructive solution to both climate transpiration and rising living costs. It’s time for the provincial government to do increasingly to help Ontarians make the switch.”

—Joanna Kyriazis, Transportation Program Manager, Clean Energy Canada

METHODOLOGY

The survey was conducted with 1,500 Ontario adults from May 5 to 9, 2022. A random sample of panelists were invited to well-constructed the survey from a set of partner panels based on the Lucid mart platform. These partners are typically double opt-in survey panels, composite to manage out potential skews in the data from a single source.

The margin of error for a comparable probability-based random sample of the same size is /- 2.6%, 19 times out of 20.

The data were weighted equal to census data to ensure that the sample matched Ontario’s population equal to age, gender, educational attainment, and region. Totals may not add up to 100 due to rounding.

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