This study investigates how energy users from government, industry, civil society, and academia perceive of energy security challenges. It also analyzes how demographic characteristics influence such perceptions, and how geography, economic structure, modes of domestic energy production, and culture shape energy security priorities. Its primary source of data is a four-part survey distributed in seven languages (English, Mandarin, Portuguese, Russian, Arabic, German, and Japanese) to 2167 respondents in Brazil, China, Germany, India, Kazakhstan, Japan, Papua New Guinea, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, and the United States. These countries were selected because they represent a mix of urban and rural populations, developed and developing economies, import- and export-oriented energy trading flows, communist and capitalist societies, liberalized and state-owned energy markets, and small and large geographic sizes. The survey results are used to test four propositions about energy security related to the education, age, occupation, and gender of respondents, as well five propositions about national energy priorities and the interconnected attributes of security of supply, energy efficiency, energy research and development, energy trade, diversification and decentralization, affordability, environmental quality, climate change, and energy governance. (C) 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.164464