Here’s a feel-good post, right around the corner for Thanksgiving: a recent poll of 20,790 respondents from 21 countries has found extremely robust support for increased renewable energy—mainly solar and wind—usage in government utilities and more energy-efficient business practices, even if doing so would require energy costs to rise. What’s more, in all the nations polled (save Russia), a majority expressed support for the belief that switching to alternative energy sources would save money in the long run.
The poll was administered by WorldPublicOpinion.org, an international collaborative project initiated and managed by the Program on International Policy Attitudes at the University of Maryland, from July 15, 2008, to November 4, just a few weeks ago. Coordinating the poll in each country through telephone or face-to-face interviews, which were conducted by various local, national and international research centers, WorldPublicOpinion.org polled roughly 600 to 1000 people in each country (for more on methodology, see here). Some results at a glance:
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Countries polled: Argentina, Azerbaijan, China (plus Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan, although their results were not included in the global averages), France, Germany, Great Britain, India, Indonesia, Italy, Jordan, Kenya, Mexico, Nigeria, the Palestinian territories, Poland, Russia, South Korea, Turkey, Thailand, Ukraine and the United States.
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77 percent (average of 21 countries) of those polled believed more emphasis should be placed in their countries on installing solar or wind energy systems.
- 74 percent believed that buildings should be modified to become more energy efficient.
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40 percent believed that the government should build more coal or nuclear-powered plants
Of course, the results differed greatly from country to country. South Korea led the pack in percentage of those polled in favor of installing more solar or wind utilities (89 percent), followed closely by France, Italy and Kenya (all 88 percent), and then the US (87 percent). The least supportive was Russia (50 percent). When posed with the question of whether or not they would support the increased use of alternative energy in utilities, should the costs of energy rise in the short run, respondents followed a similar trend: 96 percent for South Korea (does this make sense, given that only 89 percent of South Korean respondents supported increased utilization of renewables?), 88 percent for France, 88 percent for Taiwan, 87 percent for Kenya, 66 percent for the US, and so on.
While stating their support for something doesn’t necessarily guarantee that people will carry through with it—especially considering today’s turbulent economic climate, and the fact that Hong Kong was the only location in which this poll was administered before news of the economic crisis hit—there’s something reassuring about knowing that there’s a pretty solid market for all the green technology, solar and others, getting developed around the world. Was I the only one (pleasantly) surprised by the fact that so many people around the world—in both developed and developing nations—are willing to sacrifice some hard-earned money in lieu of increased energy efficiency.
