Climate change remains one of the defining challenges of this era, yet public opinion research consistently shows a troubling gap between scientific consensus and public understanding. According to a May 2026 Pew Research Center report, nearly all climate scientists agree that the planet is warming and that human activity is the primary driver. Yet fewer than half of Americans share this view. This gap matters because public support functions as a precondition for progress: when support lags, opposition-funded messaging gains ground, misinformation spreads more easily, and policy momentum stalls.
Closing this gap requires more than new policy proposals; it requires narratives capable of countering polarization and unlocking the collective will of citizens and leaders alike. The Potential Energy Coalition has built its work around this premise, applying data science, marketing research, and message testing to develop campaigns that shift attitudes and, ultimately, behavior. Since 2021, AVDF has supported this effort as part of its broader initiative to change American behavior around the climate crisis, awarding the organization two consecutive $1 million grants.
The first grant, awarded in 2021, established the foundation for Potential Energy’s flagship initiative, Science Moms, which recruits scientists who are also mothers to communicate directly with politically moderate suburban women, a demographic the organization identified as both persuadable and highly concentrated in key states. That early work generated significant national attention, including televised appearances on CBS News and The Kelly Clarkson Show.
Building on these results, AVDF renewed its support in 2024 with a second $1 million grant, which concluded having met its core objectives. Over the four years of AVDF funding, Science Moms increased the number of strong climate action supporters by 564,000, rising to 2.84 million in 2026. The most dramatic gains occurred between 2024 and 2025 when support climbed from 1.76 million to 2.86 million, a 62% increase during the period covered by the second grant. Potential Energy’s research further links these shifts to approximately 1.9 million additional individual and community actions, ranging from writing letters and attending town halls to installing heat pumps and solar panels.
These outcomes stemmed from large-scale, evidence-based messaging campaigns that reached six million people during 2024 and 2025 alone. Campaigns educated suburban mothers about the health risks posed by fossil-fuel pollution, while a companion effort, “Unnatural Disasters,” connected extreme weather events to their underlying climate causes. Notably, the organization’s 2025 Super Bowl advertisement reached more than 120 million viewers, earned a top-ten ranking from The New York Times, and generated positive sentiment that outweighed negative reactions by a 14-to-1 margin, including meaningful gains among conservative audiences.
Beyond audience reach, the grant funded research that produced practical guidance for the broader climate communications field. Chief among these findings: messaging that emphasizes material concerns, such as health risks and rising energy costs, resonates more effectively with moderate and center-right audiences than messaging centered on moral urgency or future catastrophe.
Potential Energy also piloted two new strategies during the grant period. The first, a rapid-response approach to extreme weather, deploys tailored messages immediately following major weather events and performs roughly twice as well as standard messaging, reflecting the elevated public attention such events generate. The second, a “Climate Operations Room” launched in 2025, sustains a steady stream of climate-related content across social media and digital platforms through a growing network of credible spokespeople and audience-specific channels, with the capacity to mobilize quickly when climate-related news breaks.
Recognizing the strength of these results, AVDF awarded a third grant to extend this work. The new project will introduce a Health & Toxicity Platform connecting pollution and climate change to everyday health concerns, scale the extreme weather rapid-response model into a dedicated platform, expand the Climate Operations Room from 10 to 30 owned channels and from 90 to 175 spokespeople, and strengthen measurement of how messaging translates into concrete individual and collective action.
Collectively, these components aim to generate at least five million views for health-focused messaging, 60 million views for extreme weather content, and measurable increases in both individual and collective climate action among target audiences.
Potential Energy’s work illustrates how rigorous research and strategic communication can address two persistent obstacles to climate progress: a narrative problem, in which messaging fails to connect with the concerns people already hold, and a distribution problem, in which accurate information about climate solutions struggles to reach the audiences who need it most.
“Potential Energy continues to demonstrate what disciplined, research-driven communication can accomplish at scale,” said AVDF President Michael Murray. “Their work has moved millions of Americans toward stronger climate action while giving the broader field a clearer, evidence-based understanding of what effective messaging looks like. We are pleased to continue supporting this effort as it expands into new platforms and reaches new audiences.”
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