Nathalie De Marcellis-Warin, full professor at Polytechnique Montréal and CIRANO Fellow, Ingrid Peignier, CIRANO Senior Director and Project Director, and Thomas Gleize, CIRANO Research Professional, proposed an infographic compiling 10 years of CIRANO Barometer data on environmental issues. The release of this infographic coincided with the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP27) which took place from November 6 to 18, 2022. This infographic highlights the concerns and level of confidence of Quebecers regarding the issues of climate change, water pollution and air pollution, and especially the evolution of these perceptions over the past 10 years.

Some highlights:

• Concerns about environmental and energy-related risks are on the rise between 2011 and 2021 and decline somewhat in 2022, in direct relation to the very clear and strong increase in perceived risks for economic and financial issues (due to the current inflationary context).
• 67% of Quebecers perceive " High or Very High " risks for climate change in 2022, an increase of 15 percentage points compared to 2018.
• Confidence in the government to manage certain environmental issues remains relatively low over the past 10 years. Specifically, only 12% of Quebecers have "somewhat or completely" confidence in the government to manage the issue of climate change, a proportion that has remained fairly stable since 2016.
• The publication, at the same time as the Barometer data collection, of an IPCC report in 2021 on the possibility that global warming will exceed 1.5°C in the next decade led to different results depending on whether respondents had completed the questionnaire before or after the report was published:

1. The proportion of Quebecers concerned about environmental and natural resource risks was much higher after than before the release.
2. The proportion of Quebecers perceiving a high risk for heat waves was higher before than after the publication of the report, while the opposite was true for floods. 

These findings show the importance of knowledge on all these issues and the influence of information sources on perceptions.

About the CIRANO 2022 Barometer

Analyses of survey data conducted since 2011 with samples of about 1000 respondents representative of the Quebec population to better understand the perception of risks of Quebecers on 53 issues/projects grouped into ten major categories: environmental issues (environment and natural risks), industrial issues, technological innovations issues, health issues (health system and public health), safety issues, socio-economic issues, transportation infrastructure issues and public projects issues.

To view CIRANO Barometer data since 2011: www.barometre.cirano.qc.ca