Resource Type: Polling & Surveys

This post includes climate and environment headlines, data points, and key takeaways from recent public polls – including new polling on the Build Back Better plan and its major clean energy and climate provisions and a new poll assessing voters’ trust in the two parties to handle climate and environmental issues. 

This post includes climate and environment headlines, data points, and key takeaways from recent public polls – including new polling about Build Back Better and clean energy incentives, a new poll of Black and Latino Americans about climate and environmental justice issues, new findings from Yale and George Mason’s long-running “Six Americas” tracking study, and a newly released summary of the past year’s polling on climate and environmental issues.
You can also find a press release on the EPC’s end-of-year polling takeaways here, which was put out this week by EDF Action, the League of Conservation Voters, NRDC, Sierra Club, and the Climate Action Campaign.

In 2021, we saw high and enduring public support for a range of actions that would address the climate crisis and put the country on a path to a cleaner future. The 70% of Americans who say they are at least “somewhat” worried about global warming is the highest figure recorded since this surveying began in 2008. A September 2021 poll also found that 70% of Americans believe that global warming is affecting weather in the United States, a new high. Americans are most likely to believe that global warming is having at least “some” effect on hot weather events such as extreme heat (68%), wildfires (67%), and droughts (66%). While Pew found that 65% of Republican voters in early 2020 believed that the country should prioritize renewables over fossil fuels, more Republican voters in April 2021 said that expanding fossil fuels should be the country’s energy priority (52%) than developing alternative energy sources (47%). However, Republican voters reported far less confidence in Republican politicians in their ability to handle environmental issues, as compared to other issues such as the economy or immigration. More Democrats said that passing a bill to address climate change and its effects should be a “top priority” for Congress (56%) than any other priority aside from stimulating the economy to recover from the coronavirus pandemic (60%) and passing a healthcare reform bill (57%). This report also includes survey data summaries about Build Back Better, scientists as trusted authorities, and holding corporations accountable.