“Not a single government dollar as a result of this announcement in gas, not one,” Albanese told ABC radio.

“This isn’t a gas-led recovery. We’re not saying that at all.”

Questions are being raised about financial support for gas after Wednesday’s announcement of $566 million in funding for the Commonwealth’s Geoscience Australia to conduct mapping of mineral and gas deposits across the country and its territorial waters.

The Labor Environment Action Network said the strategy failed to include measures to reduce gas usage, like incentives to switch to electric appliances, which meant its push for new supply made it appear as “boosterism for the gas industry”.

“LEAN is disappointed the government is focusing so heavily on the need for new gas supply instead of managing down gas demand,” the grassroots organisation said in a statement.

Climate Change and Energy Minister Chris Bowen said on Friday that the MPs questioning the gas strategy “are not a pressure group on the side of a parliament” and argued that the government’s ambition to rapidly ramp up renewables had not changed.

“Josh [Burns] said he believes the emphasis should be on renewable energy and promoting renewable energy. I agree. Guess what? So does Madeleine King, so does Anthony Albanese, so does the cabinet,” Bowen said.

“That’s why we’re lifting renewable energy from 30 per cent of our National Energy Market to 82 per cent by 2030.”

Bowen said gas had a role to play in supplying backup power for renewables but stressed that the government’s focus was decarbonising the economy.

He announced the government had opened a tender under the government’s scheme to underwrite private companies to build wind and solar farms.

“Today’s announcement of 1.4 gigawatts for Victoria, which is enough renewable energy for 700,000 homes, is a very important part of that drive towards a renewable energy future,” Bowen said.

Opposition energy spokesman Ted O’Brien said the gas strategy failed to deliver tangible measures to assist industry in developing new projects in the near term and claimed the policy had been dictated by ideological opposition to fossil fuels.

“Labor’s so called ‘gas strategy’ reads more like an obituary for the sector as it kills off any chances of Labor getting any additional gas out of the ground,” O’Brien said.

“It’s disappointing to see [Resources Minister] King miss yet another opportunity to deliver a credible gas policy because she has been rolled by her ideological colleagues.”

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Environmental groups said despite the government’s support for renewables, its push for new gas projects undermined moves to curb greenhouse emissions from fossil fuels.

“It’s an error by the Albanese government to direct resources away from the necessary energy transition, towards propping up an industry that is completely misaligned with Australia’s national interest,” Wilderness Society policy and strategy manager Tim Beshara said.

“The Morrison government tried to bail out the industry with its reprehensible ‘gas-fired recovery’ launched in response to COVID-19, and it didn’t stop the industry’s decline.”