“Equal Rights for Oil and Electricity”? Public Perspectives and Moral Divisions in China’s Vehicle Energy Transition

With the rapid proliferation of new energy vehicles in the Chinese market, traditional fuel vehicles face significant survival challenges, sparking debate on “equal rights for oil and electricity.” Using mixed-methods text mining to analyze large-scale online discussions on Chinese social media, this study explores public perspectives and moral foundations regarding vehicle energy transitions. Latent Dirichlet allocation (LDA) topic modeling identified six main themes: policy allocation, unintended consequences, inadequate support, market competition, community awareness, and industrial benefits. Applying moral foundation theory, we reveal how underlying moral cognition shapes energy preferences. The application of moral foundation theory revealed the differences in moral cognition among the public on the issue of energy transition. Notably, loyalty/betrayal emerged as a central moral foundation across the discourse, reflecting the alignment of public and national collective interests. Comments supporting “equal rights for oil and electricity” more commonly adopted the moral foundations of fairness/cheating and sanctity/degradation, while opposing comments more frequently employed authority/subversion, loyalty/betrayal, and care/harm. The study also provided insights into the hidden moral cognition differences between themes with similar stances, with a focus on specific issues often accompanied by an emphasis on particular moral foundations. The five moral foundations can construct a logically coherent view of energy transition. This study highlights an under-researched stakeholder perspective and contributes to understanding the overlooked social dimension of vehicle energy transition. The findings also offer theoretical insights into the social and cultural factors shaping energy transition and provide data-driven guidance for policy communication and formulation.