Americans Have Become Less Concerned About Climate Change

The Trump administration’s efforts to roll back Biden-era renewable energy investments have caused some corporate consternation at a time when those sources have become cheaper and the demand for energy is rising due in part to technologies such as artificial intelligence.

And though Republicans’ most successful volley on this front to date — accomplished via the party’s so-called One Big Beautiful Bill Act — divides Americans, per Morning Consult data, our broader trends suggest that environmental advocates must acknowledge a new reality: Climate change is no longer as hot a topic for the U.S. public.  

Traditional energy sources such as oil and coal that have caused the planet to warm have risen in popularity, and Americans have become less likely to express concern about climate change, or to believe humanity is causing it.

According to our July 18-20 survey, 37% of voters are “very concerned” with the issue of climate change and its impacts, down from 44% in 2021 at the beginning of the Biden administration. In total, 67% of voters are at least “somewhat concerned” about the matter, a figure that has also declined, from 76%, since 2021.

While there have been modest declines in the shares of Democrats and Republicans who express high levels of concern about climate change, it remains a big fear for voters on the left, who are three times as likely to be very concerned than those in Trump’s party. Notably, the bulk of the decline came among voters affiliated with neither party, whose numbers largely align with the overall electorate.

Despite the decline in fears of climate change’s impacts, there has been a boost in the shares of voters who say they are very fearful about the impact of extreme weather events such as floods, hurricanes, wildfires and tornadoes in a year which so far has featured high-profile disasters like the deadly water surge along the Guadalupe River in Texas and wild fires in Southern California.

Two in 5 voters are “very concerned” about how natural disasters will affect their communities, up from 37% in 2021. The shift was largest among independent voters, who — like the larger electorate, including both Democrats and Republicans — are more concerned about these weather events than their underlying cause, climate change.

As Americans have become less trusting in institutions such as academia and science, spurred in part by the pandemic and Republican rhetoric, they’ve also become less adherent to the idea that humanity is at fault.

Half of Americans (51%) now say climate change is being caused by human activity, down from 58% in a survey we conducted in 2018. The shares of Republicans and independents who subscribe to the scientific conclusion have each dropped 4 percentage points, while the decline among Democrats has been twice that size.

Those shifts in public opinion leave prominent clean energy sources such as wind and solar less popular than they were at the beginning of this decade, though they remain favored over planet-warming fuels such as oil and coal.

The majority of Americans hold favorable views about power from solar, the most popular energy source, and wind, but those ratings have each dropped by more than 10 points since 2021 as the shares with favorable views of oil (56%) and coal (45%) have each ticked up by 6 points.

The bottom line

The juxtaposition of these data trends paint a mixed picture for Washington, the renewable energy industry and corporate America more broadly. 

On one hand, the public is shifting away from its fears about climate change and affinity for cleaner energy sources. But on the other, the bulk of the population still favors these energy sources and is concerned about the planet — and many also still want to see businesses act to protect it.

Our 2025 corporate political engagement survey showed that 72% of Americans, including most Republicans and Democrats, believe businesses have a responsibility to protect and take care of the environment through efforts to reduce environmental waste or their carbon footprint, down only slightly since the previous year. Similarly, most Americans (62%) think it is important for businesses to speak out on the environment and climate change, almost exactly the share who said the same in 2024.

From a broad perspective, that means companies who backtrack on environmental commitments still face reputational risks. In a narrower sense, environmental advocates with the ear of the Democratic Party’s loudest voices would do well to take cues from the renewables sector itself.

As our recent study of open-end responses suggested, Republicans’ attacks on the renewables sector could ultimately cost them some political capital if Americans ultimately blame them for any hikes in energy prices in the near future. But that’s only going to happen if Democrats are able to pivot their messaging from climate change concerns to the practical and economic implications that resonate with a broader audience.