Some folks are incredibly interested in the climate issue and what should be done about it but for many I expect it’s background noise until it actually affects them. This is nicely illustrated by the "how much would you spend" questions. I would think those who spend little time thinking about the issue will be passive consumers of whatever the government is promoting at the moment. As of late January 2025 what the government is promoting on the climate file has radically changed from when this survey was conducted. What’s more Trump’s change in focus has had an impact beyond the U.S. and is shifting the zeitgeist away from the sense of urgency that European and even Canadian governments were pushing when it seemed to be consistent with where the U.S. was heading. It would be very interesting to repeat the survey a year after this one and see if there’s a significant change in the responses. One question that I would have found interesting but didn't see would be "If the U.S. were to abandon efforts to reach net zero by 2050 and let cost considerations define the energy mix without regard to climate how much warmer would it be by end century? 0.1°F, 0.5°F .....)
Turn down the rhetoric and insults- both sides! Both sides are responsible for inflicting and exhibiting a lot of pain, hurt feelings and anger that promote tribalism. Though I'm with the survey majority and a critic of "the narrative" since around 2008, I find some of your comments biased. "Climate porn" is one of them. Also, many conservatives are complicit in promoting climate as a wedge issue, doing the same thing that climate activists are guilty of- ridiculing and demonizing the opposition- those "climate activists". Roger, your comments gloss over this. The tribalism that Judith Curry pointed out so long ago, occurs on both sides. I've read WUWT faithfully since its beginning and seen its tenor, even sometimes the tone of Anthony Watts himself, shift from "what's that" scientific inquiry to partisanship that often even supports the most outrageous, nasty rhetoric, and deeds of the Trump administration. Climate science and energy policy, unlike the abortion issue where both sides have respectable positions, is not a binary choice. Tribalism narrows choices and removes common ground. "All of the above" and other poling results is much more hopeful. Reading Mathew Arnold's "Dover Beach" and Auden's "September 1 1939" helps me with the anger part and perspective.
Very good article. It is apparent that climate alarmists have failed to convince the American public of catastrophic manmade climate change. The need for plentiful and reliable energy sources is America's top priority. Wind and solar can't do it. Both may have a future in a "Let's try eveything world".
Roger, I think The Honest Broker provides a great service to Society and the current article is both informative and encouraging. HOWEVER, I must protest to the use of the term "Climate Advocates" to describe "activist scientists and journalists" serving up a "steady diet of climate porn." This represents a perversion of the language that even someone like you has fallen prey to. These climate pornographers are NOT distinguished by being "advovcates" for "Climate." Strongly opposing them doesn't mean you're uncaring about Climate.
Great article……however, the mismatch is even broader. This excerpt from the latest NCEA newsletter demonstrates how academia’s perspective and priorities are also out of step with the general public view:
“We examined more than 1,400 energy courses across the top 50 U.S. universities. The results are unambiguous: most courses are focused on energy policies directed at abandoning fossil fuels to reduce CO2 emissions—not to understand the nature and role of the existing energy systems that power the economy.
Seventy-one percent of courses have a climate-centered objective. Wind, solar, and geothermal dominate the course descriptions. Fossil fuel technologies—responsible for more than 80% of global energy—are entirely absent from the top ten energy technologies across all the courses. Yet, oil, gas, and coal, are the backbone of modern civilization.”
Outstanding comment. It is definitely a one sided story in our universities. Climate professors protect their jobs just like Russian Literature professors protect theirs. Whether they are of use to the public at large is irrelvant as long as the Academia/News media/ Democrat coalition can continue to fund itself at the expense of the American public.
Remember, until relatively recently, the climate propagandists were claiming that the "energy transition" would save everyone money and cost society less.
It was only as reality raised its ugly head and proved beyond a doubt that wind/solar/batteries are driving energy costs up stupendously that the narrative changed to one of sacrifice.
I'd love to see what USA citizens would be willing to pay if the question was focused on increasing one's bill to "improve the robustness of our infrastructure to protect against weather-related natural disasters".
Is that even possible? Can the infrastructure be protected 24/7/365? The better question is, what are you willing to pay for "X" amount of guaranteed no disruption.
Roger, I really appreciate all that you do to help us understand the complexity of the climate. Now I ask only one thing, I wish, that you and others with influence would remove "change" from the "climate change" language. We all know that the climate changes. If not, maybe you could enlighten me and others as to why you wouldn't support a move to remove "change".
My faith in the public has been restored. The real question is how to get to a pragmatic set of policies the vast majority can support. Scaring them with worst case scenarios won't do it but I don't get the sense the people who promote them want to change one iota.
If the public was truly pragmatic, they would not support "all of the above". Wind and solar have no place on a reliable grid, unless there's a large amount of hydro to load balance and even then it's debatable.
There still is a place for solar at a small scale. It works for many small remote places. Even the US Army has found it useful for troop ployments for charging batteries.
I think “all of the above” is like ordering a medium at a fast food restaurant or coffee shop. They’re not going all in, i.e. large, or selecting something very small. They are just picking something that sounds reasonable because they don’t really know much about it.
THANK YOU for this work. I think an important addition to your observation ("Americans are overwhelmingly far more pragmatic than views found in the media or even those of most elected officials") is the appointed/unelected people who steer/lead various agencies (state, especially) are often times even further removed from public pragmatism.
Don't forget the leaders of the NGOs that are pouring out a constant drum beat of climate propaganda (and lawsuits) that the media republishes without analysis or editing.
The lesson I learn from this survey is that the people in the extremes of opinion should not be allowed to set policy. Such true believers make the most noise, but their simplistic world view means they will always be wrong in crucial ways. The temptation is to give such loud voices what they want, for the sake of an easy life. But for too long, such fanatics have been given much more influence on policy than they have earned with logic, reason and facts.
I found it interesting that wind power ranked dead last as a preferred energy source. I think wind power will (if you’ll excuse the phrase) sunset in the next 20 years. My other observation in the full study (which wasn’t that long) was how practical and common sense respondents’ answers were.
Totally OT, but friend sent me this. I'm dubious of anything from China, and find it hard to believe their CO2 emissions have peaked. (And if they heavily rely on intermittents, then the amount of CO2 released will vary from year to year, depending on wind and sun intensities, no?) I sense the author is a bit of an intermittents flack, but that could be unfair.
Mark Kruger must either be a rabid dissembler or not gotten the clear memo from the Chinese government since it was announced that the country would cease subsidizing wind and it's coal sector has planned and currently built coal plants the output of which dwarfs the US's capability. That's on top of the exisiting coal plants. Anyone who thinks the Chinese will achieve some false "net zero" fundamentally misunderstands reality. Add to that Indonesia's rapidly scaling coal energy output (70% increase from 2015 through 2023) and its importation of coking coal to enable production of PVs and you have a giant problem for people in hip suits talking about solar and wind creating a utopian future.
Thanks for including the survey questions and answers! By chance did you ask the participants to denote their zip code or state?
Some folks are incredibly interested in the climate issue and what should be done about it but for many I expect it’s background noise until it actually affects them. This is nicely illustrated by the "how much would you spend" questions. I would think those who spend little time thinking about the issue will be passive consumers of whatever the government is promoting at the moment. As of late January 2025 what the government is promoting on the climate file has radically changed from when this survey was conducted. What’s more Trump’s change in focus has had an impact beyond the U.S. and is shifting the zeitgeist away from the sense of urgency that European and even Canadian governments were pushing when it seemed to be consistent with where the U.S. was heading. It would be very interesting to repeat the survey a year after this one and see if there’s a significant change in the responses. One question that I would have found interesting but didn't see would be "If the U.S. were to abandon efforts to reach net zero by 2050 and let cost considerations define the energy mix without regard to climate how much warmer would it be by end century? 0.1°F, 0.5°F .....)
Turn down the rhetoric and insults- both sides! Both sides are responsible for inflicting and exhibiting a lot of pain, hurt feelings and anger that promote tribalism. Though I'm with the survey majority and a critic of "the narrative" since around 2008, I find some of your comments biased. "Climate porn" is one of them. Also, many conservatives are complicit in promoting climate as a wedge issue, doing the same thing that climate activists are guilty of- ridiculing and demonizing the opposition- those "climate activists". Roger, your comments gloss over this. The tribalism that Judith Curry pointed out so long ago, occurs on both sides. I've read WUWT faithfully since its beginning and seen its tenor, even sometimes the tone of Anthony Watts himself, shift from "what's that" scientific inquiry to partisanship that often even supports the most outrageous, nasty rhetoric, and deeds of the Trump administration. Climate science and energy policy, unlike the abortion issue where both sides have respectable positions, is not a binary choice. Tribalism narrows choices and removes common ground. "All of the above" and other poling results is much more hopeful. Reading Mathew Arnold's "Dover Beach" and Auden's "September 1 1939" helps me with the anger part and perspective.
Very good article. It is apparent that climate alarmists have failed to convince the American public of catastrophic manmade climate change. The need for plentiful and reliable energy sources is America's top priority. Wind and solar can't do it. Both may have a future in a "Let's try eveything world".
Roger, I think The Honest Broker provides a great service to Society and the current article is both informative and encouraging. HOWEVER, I must protest to the use of the term "Climate Advocates" to describe "activist scientists and journalists" serving up a "steady diet of climate porn." This represents a perversion of the language that even someone like you has fallen prey to. These climate pornographers are NOT distinguished by being "advovcates" for "Climate." Strongly opposing them doesn't mean you're uncaring about Climate.
Great article……however, the mismatch is even broader. This excerpt from the latest NCEA newsletter demonstrates how academia’s perspective and priorities are also out of step with the general public view:
“We examined more than 1,400 energy courses across the top 50 U.S. universities. The results are unambiguous: most courses are focused on energy policies directed at abandoning fossil fuels to reduce CO2 emissions—not to understand the nature and role of the existing energy systems that power the economy.
Seventy-one percent of courses have a climate-centered objective. Wind, solar, and geothermal dominate the course descriptions. Fossil fuel technologies—responsible for more than 80% of global energy—are entirely absent from the top ten energy technologies across all the courses. Yet, oil, gas, and coal, are the backbone of modern civilization.”
Outstanding comment. It is definitely a one sided story in our universities. Climate professors protect their jobs just like Russian Literature professors protect theirs. Whether they are of use to the public at large is irrelvant as long as the Academia/News media/ Democrat coalition can continue to fund itself at the expense of the American public.
Tenured academia is farther removed from reality than the politicians.
Remember, until relatively recently, the climate propagandists were claiming that the "energy transition" would save everyone money and cost society less.
It was only as reality raised its ugly head and proved beyond a doubt that wind/solar/batteries are driving energy costs up stupendously that the narrative changed to one of sacrifice.
I'd love to see what USA citizens would be willing to pay if the question was focused on increasing one's bill to "improve the robustness of our infrastructure to protect against weather-related natural disasters".
Is that even possible? Can the infrastructure be protected 24/7/365? The better question is, what are you willing to pay for "X" amount of guaranteed no disruption.
100% isn't possible and I appreciate your point -- even if I didn't mean to imply 100%.
Roger, I really appreciate all that you do to help us understand the complexity of the climate. Now I ask only one thing, I wish, that you and others with influence would remove "change" from the "climate change" language. We all know that the climate changes. If not, maybe you could enlighten me and others as to why you wouldn't support a move to remove "change".
My faith in the public has been restored. The real question is how to get to a pragmatic set of policies the vast majority can support. Scaring them with worst case scenarios won't do it but I don't get the sense the people who promote them want to change one iota.
If the public was truly pragmatic, they would not support "all of the above". Wind and solar have no place on a reliable grid, unless there's a large amount of hydro to load balance and even then it's debatable.
There still is a place for solar at a small scale. It works for many small remote places. Even the US Army has found it useful for troop ployments for charging batteries.
But most, if not all, of those remote applications are not connected to a grid that is meant to be reliable.
I think “all of the above” is like ordering a medium at a fast food restaurant or coffee shop. They’re not going all in, i.e. large, or selecting something very small. They are just picking something that sounds reasonable because they don’t really know much about it.
THANK YOU for this work. I think an important addition to your observation ("Americans are overwhelmingly far more pragmatic than views found in the media or even those of most elected officials") is the appointed/unelected people who steer/lead various agencies (state, especially) are often times even further removed from public pragmatism.
Don't forget the leaders of the NGOs that are pouring out a constant drum beat of climate propaganda (and lawsuits) that the media republishes without analysis or editing.
The media is our primary problem in many things. The truth ain't in them.
The lesson I learn from this survey is that the people in the extremes of opinion should not be allowed to set policy. Such true believers make the most noise, but their simplistic world view means they will always be wrong in crucial ways. The temptation is to give such loud voices what they want, for the sake of an easy life. But for too long, such fanatics have been given much more influence on policy than they have earned with logic, reason and facts.
Great info here, Roger. Attaboy.
Nice to see I'm with the majority for once in nearly everything.
I found it interesting that wind power ranked dead last as a preferred energy source. I think wind power will (if you’ll excuse the phrase) sunset in the next 20 years. My other observation in the full study (which wasn’t that long) was how practical and common sense respondents’ answers were.
Roger,
Totally OT, but friend sent me this. I'm dubious of anything from China, and find it hard to believe their CO2 emissions have peaked. (And if they heavily rely on intermittents, then the amount of CO2 released will vary from year to year, depending on wind and sun intensities, no?) I sense the author is a bit of an intermittents flack, but that could be unfair.
https://www.yicaiglobal.com/opinion/mark.kruger/chinas-emissions-peak-what-are-the-implications?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email
Mark Kruger must either be a rabid dissembler or not gotten the clear memo from the Chinese government since it was announced that the country would cease subsidizing wind and it's coal sector has planned and currently built coal plants the output of which dwarfs the US's capability. That's on top of the exisiting coal plants. Anyone who thinks the Chinese will achieve some false "net zero" fundamentally misunderstands reality. Add to that Indonesia's rapidly scaling coal energy output (70% increase from 2015 through 2023) and its importation of coking coal to enable production of PVs and you have a giant problem for people in hip suits talking about solar and wind creating a utopian future.
And perhaps their CO2 emissions have gone down because their economy is not strong. If their economy improves their emissions would probably go up.
But sooner or later, with the global debt crisis, that may cause emissions to go down as economies collapse.
Markets can stay irrational longer than you can stay solvent.