2015 Canadian Public Opinion on Climate Change

As part of its ongoing Focus Canada public opinion research program, the Environics Institute partnered with the David Suzuki Foundation to ask Canadians about climate change, to determine how perceptions have changed (or not) over the past year or so.

It has been almost a decade since climate change became widely recognized outside of scientific circles as a pressing global challenge. The world-wide financial meltdown in 2008-09 and a lack of progress in securing international consensus about how to address the problem pushed the issue off the front pages for years to come.  More recently, climate change appears to be reemerging as a global priority, the result of growing scientific evidence, an expanding number of extreme weather events (e.g., the multi-year drought now punishing the west coast), an unexpected new agreement on emissions targets between the US and China, and an historical encyclical by Pope Francis.  Together, these developments are contributing to fresh momentum for a new global pact at this year’s international climate summit in Paris, which some believe is the best and perhaps last hope for an effective response to the challenge.

Canada has been notably quiet amidst these developments. The federal government has done little beyond making vague commitments and climate change is clearly a side issue in the current Federal Election campaign. Does this reflect a lack of interest among Canadians, or is there in fact a clear public will for the country to make a greater commitment to this challenge at the domestic and international level? To answer this question, the Environics Institute for Survey Research once again partnered with the David Suzuki Foundation to take a new sounding of public opinion on climate change, as part of its ongoing Focus Canada research program.  Focus Canada is the country’s longest-running national public opinion research program, and is now a public interest initiative providing credible, independent and sustained insight into Canadian public opinion on important issues facing the country.

Survey Details

The survey is based on telephone interviews conducted with 2,004 Canadians between August 4 and 16, 2015. A sample of this size drawn from the population produces results accurate to within plus or minus 2.2 percentage points in 19 out of 20 samples.

Partners

The Environics Institute partnered with the David Suzuki Foundation on this report.