public opinion

A recently released report by VeraQuest Inc. titled “VeraGreen: A Look at American Attitudes and Behaviors on Environmental Issues,” examines how Americans view environmental issues such as global warming and the involvement of government in the private sector. The report surveyed a stratified random sample of 3,506 online...[read more]

A new study from the Carbon Trust reveals a divide between Generation Y’s attitude to carbon reduction in the East and West. The study, which questioned over 2,500 young people aged 18-25, across five continents in Brazil, China, South Africa, the Republic of Korea, the United Kingdom and the United States of America, sought to...[read more]

Speaking at a TEDx event at The Evergreen State College,  Grist staff writer David Roberts pushes back against the concerted effort to confuse and sow doubt about climate change. The key points about climate change, its causes and effects, are simple, Robert says. Give him 15 minutes and he’ll prove it.[read more]

A Gallup poll shows 57% of Americans favor its continued use A poll published by the Gallup organization shows that a majority of Americans continue to favor the use of nuclear energy as one of the ways to provide electricity for the U.S. According to the poll, the 57% who favor nuclear power this year is identical to the percentage...[read more]

Via the NYT Green blog comes a new survey by the Pew Center indicating that a smaller majority of Americans now prefer further federal funding of research into alternative energy technologies (specifically, wind, solar, and hydrogen) as a priority over additional exploration of oil and gas supplies. If the comparison seems to be a bit of...[read more]

Geoengineering research is emerging from the laboratory. Government-funded scientists in the UK are moving forward with a pair of small-scale, carefully-controlled experiments–one to test the qualities of particles that could be used to block the sun’s rays, and another in which droplets of water will be pumped into the air using a one-...[read more]

Yet another poll is out that details one more time how far American opinion on climate change is moving in the wrong direction. Since July 2006, the percentage of Americans who think “there is solid evidence the earth is warming” has dropped from 79% to 59%, and the overall portion blaming it on human activity dropped from 50% to 34%....[read more]

This is the first two parts of a multi-part series by guest blogger William Becker, executive director of the Presidential Climate Action Project. 1.  THE SITUATION There will come a time when governments are forced to act on global climate change. Its impacts will be increasingly devastating and undeniable. Its costs will swell...[read more]

News flash: Americans are confused about global warming. Of course, that's not exactly earth-shattering news, considering the bevy of polling data released during the past year, much of which has shown declining majority support for the view that global warming is primarily caused by human activities — a view held by the vast majority of climate scientists.[read more]

In 9 of 15 issues examined in a recent AP-GfK Poll (pdf), more Americans who expressed intense interest in an issue voiced strong opposition to Obama's work on it, including the economy, unemployment, federal deficits and terrorism.Respondents were about evenly split over the president's efforts on five issues and strongly approved of...[read more]

Many of the issues we face with renewable energy and clean tech in general are technological problems, but I would argue many more of them have to do with framing the issues and convincing people to change. Technology won’t do it by itself, the adoption and change of behavior will be the hard part. We can learn a lot of lessons...[read more]

The majority of Americans do believe that Earth's climate is warming and they want the government to take action, according to Stanford Professor Jon Krosnick and his Political Psychology Research Group, but they still don't want to pay higher taxes. These findings echo Breakthrough's own social values research demonstrating strong...[read more]

As the BP oil disaster drags on, the public’s desire for clean energy investments and increased oversight of corporate polluters has greatly intensified.  CAP’s Daniel J. Weiss and intern Ariel Powell have the important data and charts from a major new poll. The League of Conservation Voters commissioned a poll by the Benenson...[read more]

  Podcast – download the MP3 File Here During a recent conversation over the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, a friend asked if anyone in the group was boycotting BP.  This led to a lively discussion about the effectiveness of boycotts and the inevitable question, “Who do you boycott?” Before I answer that question, I want to make...[read more]

In the wake of the largest oil disaster in U.S. history, two just released polls by USA Today/Gallup show that Americans are increasingly skeptical of increased offshore drilling.  In the one month since the April 20th explosion at the Deepwater Horizon rig, support for more offshore drilling has dropped by nearly 20 percent – a...[read more]