Sign In or Create an Account.

By continuing, you agree to the Terms of Service and acknowledge our Privacy Policy

Climate

Americans on the Coast Actually Love Offshore Wind, a New Poll Shows

The whales will be fine.

Wind turbines.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

Last year, I got two kinds of stories about offshore wind in my inbox. One was about the industry’s struggle with inflation and higher interest rates. The other was about rampant claims that the industry was killing whales — an idea for which there is no evidence, and which was found to be spread by groups with ties to the fossil fuel industry.

But while both narratives have set the industry back to some extent, neither appears to have damaged public support for building wind farms in the ocean. Americans living on the coasts largely support offshore wind and want to see the industry continue to grow, according to a new poll.

The poll was conducted in November 2023 by Climate Nexus, a climate change strategic communications group, and Turn Forward, an offshore wind advocacy nonprofit that says it does not receive funding from wind farm developers.

A representative sample of 2,038 adults living in coastal counties along the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans and Gulf of Mexico were asked about their views of offshore wind. More than two-thirds responded that they support offshore wind farm construction, and 63% responded favorably when asked specifically whether they supported offshore wind farms near where they lived. Nearly 60% endorsed the U.S. government selling more leases to expand the industry’s development.

Public sentiment, for the most part, was positive across party lines. The majority of Republican respondents also said they supported offshore wind, both in general (57%), and near where they live (52%).

A more polarizing question was whether respondents preferred offshore wind development to expanding offshore oil and gas, with 71% of Democrats opting for wind but only 33% of Republicans. (26% of Republicans said they had no preference.)

One of the more intriguing parts of the poll tried to suss out what people had heard and read about offshore wind, and where they were getting information about the emerging industry. Local opposition groups like Protect Our Coast New Jersey have developed large followings on Facebook, where members share their fears that wind turbines will harm marine mammals, tourism, and property values — and also argue against the basic facts of climate change. Several grassroots groups, including Protect Our Coast New Jersey, have been found to have financial relationships with fossil fuel-funded think tanks like the Caesar Rodney Institute.

Conservative outlets like Fox News have also fueled the narrative that offshore wind development is killing whales. Media Matters, a media watchdog, found that Fox has “aired at least 54 segments suggesting that offshore wind development is causing whale deaths.” A report published last year by researchers at Brown University that mapped out the networks of anti-offshore wind groups in the U.S. suggested that social networks and conservative news outlets like Fox function as “a feedback loop of opposition and misinformation.”

According to the new poll, 53% of coastal Americans have received information about offshore wind on TV news, and 48% have seen posts about it on social media. Those were the two top sources of information, followed by newspapers, family and friends, and TV ads. But even so, most respondents — 56% — said that everything they have seen, read, or heard about offshore wind has been more positive than negative.

But while the poll may be a good temperature check on public sentiment, it doesn’t necessarily change some of the headwinds that offshore wind development faces. An earlier report from Columbia University researchers found that local opposition to renewable energy projects, including offshore wind projects, is growing. The report specifically documents instances where community groups have passed laws to block projects or filed lawsuits against developers or local officials.

There are currently four lawsuits pending in federal court against Vineyard Wind, a project that is already under construction, from a group called Nantucket Residents Against Turbines. In New Jersey, at least two communities passed resolutions last year calling on state and federal officials to impose a moratorium on offshore wind projects, citing whale deaths. And last October, a group called Protect Our Coast LINY celebrated a victory when New York Governor Kathy Hochul vetoed a bill that would have greenlit placing an offshore wind transmission cable under the sand in Long Beach, which the group had been fighting.

Even if the majority of coastal citizens support an American offshore wind industry, a vocal minority can still wield a lot of power to hold it back — especially when they have the backing of fossil fuel money.

Blue

You’re out of free articles.

Subscribe today to experience Heatmap’s expert analysis 
of climate change, clean energy, and sustainability.
To continue reading
Create a free account or sign in to unlock more free articles.
or
Please enter an email address
By continuing, you agree to the Terms of Service and acknowledge our Privacy Policy
Politics

AM Briefing: Trump and COP29

On the looming climate summit, clean energy stocks, and Hurricane Rafael

What Trump Means for COP29
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

Current conditions: A winter storm could bring up to 4 feet of snow to parts of Colorado and New Mexico • At least 89 people are still missing from extreme flooding in Spain • The Mountain Fire in Southern California has consumed 14,000 acres and is zero percent contained.

THE TOP FIVE

1. Climate world grapples with fallout from Trump win

The world is still reeling from the results of this week’s U.S. presidential election, and everyone is trying to get some idea of what a second Trump term means for policy – both at home and abroad. Perhaps most immediately, Trump’s election is “set to cast a pall over the UN COP29 summit next week,” said the Financial Times. Already many world leaders and business executives have said they will not attend the climate talks in Azerbaijan, where countries will aim to set a new goal for climate finance. “The U.S., as the world’s richest country and key shareholder in international financial institutions, is viewed as crucial to that goal,” the FT added.

Keep reading...Show less
Yellow
Politics

The 2 Climate Bulwarks Against the Next Trump Presidency​

State-level policies and “unstoppable” momentum for clean energy.

A plant growing out of a crack.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

As the realities of Trump’s return to office and the likelihood of a Republican trifecta in Washington began to set in on Wednesday morning, climate and clean energy advocates mostly did not sugarcoat the result or look for a silver lining. But in press releases and interviews, reactions to the news coalesced around two key ways to think about what happens next.

Like last time Trump was elected, the onus will now fall on state and local leaders to make progress on climate change in spite of — and likely in direct conflict with — shifting federal priorities. Working to their advantage, though, much more so than last time, is global political and economic momentum behind the growth of clean energy.

Keep reading...Show less
Green
Podcast

The Inflation Reduction Act Is About to Be Tested

Rob and Jesse talk about what comes next in the shift to clean energy.

Donald Trump.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

Last night, Donald Trump secured a second term in the White House. He campaigned on an aggressively pro-fossil -fuel agenda, promising to repeal the Inflation Reduction Act, Biden’s landmark 2022 climate law, and roll back Environmental Protection Agency rules governing power plant and car and truck pollution.

On this week’s episode of Shift Key, Jesse and Rob pick through the results of the election and try to figure out where climate advocates go from here. What will Trump 2.0 mean for the federal government’s climate policy? Did climate policies notch any wins at the state level on Tuesday night? And where should decarbonization advocates focus their energy in the months and years to come? Shift Key is hosted by Robinson Meyer, the founding executive editor of Heatmap, and Jesse Jenkins, a professor of energy systems engineering at Princeton University.

Keep reading...Show less