With the news of the demise of the Keystone Pipeline, I wanted to flag some new Insight survey data on fracking. (No, not directly connected; but both centered on energy policy and the environment.) In our question, we asked “Which best fits your opinion about the drilling process calling hydraulic fracturing or “fracking”?
We gave three possible answers (in randomized order).
a) It’s brought cheap natural gas to consumers so I support it
b) It may be necessary but it should be heavily regulated
c) It should be banned. It’s bad for the environment
d) I don’t know enough about it
As you can imagine, among center-left readers, answer a) got minimal support. And d) didn’t get much more. The real action was between b) and c).
Also not surprisingly, flat out opposition was greater the further you go to the left. So for instance, outright opposition bested heavy regulation by an almost 2 to 1 margin among readers who defined themselves as “far left” and the numbers were roughly flipped for readers who defined themselves as “center left”
What really struck me however was the stark division along gender lines.
Among men, 37% were for an absolute ban whereas 57% supported heavy regulation. But among women, it was almost exactly reversed. 62% of women were for an absolute ban and only 35% were for heavy regulation. This division along gender lines seems broadly intuitive for the way men and women approach these issues in our current politics. But such a dramatic difference surprised me.