Giving Compass' Take:

• In this story from Pacific Standard, author Kate Wheeling discusses a recent study from the Yale Program for Climate Change Communication which finds that the vast majority of Americans, from across the political spectrum, support clean and renewable energy policies.

• How can clean and renewable energy advocates use this mass public support to affect policy change? What steps can advocates take outside of the policy realm? If clean and renewable energy policies are so popular, why has Congress not yet passed any?

• To learn why passage of a bill is usually not linked to the popularity of the policy, watch this video.

Americans across the political spectrum support policies that promote renewable energy sources, according to a new report from the Yale Program for Climate Change Communication. The report surveyed nearly 1,000 registered voters in the United States, and found that 95 percent of Democrats and 71 percent of Republicans were in favor of policies requiring utilities to produce 100 percent of electricity from renewable or clean sources by 2050. About half of all respondents were even willing to pay more on their utility bills for it.

Even among those who agree that we need to rapidly decarbonize our energy sector—not to mention transportation, agriculture, manufacturing, and every other industry—there is some debate over how to get there. The society-wide transition is almost certainly going to involve the electrification of cars, trains, heating systems, and a whole slate of other products that currently rely on the combustion of fossil fuels to function— which ultimately will mean massive growth in demand for power from the electricity grid. The center of debate is whether renewable energy alone can meet the expected increase in demand, or whether we'll need to use clean sources of energy too. (Whether or not our electricity grid is currently capable of handling the necessary increase in capacity is an equally important question.)

Read the full article about renewable energy by Kate Wheeling at Pacific Standard