The survey found support for:
•Funding more research on renewable energy, such
as solar and wind power (85 percent)
•Tax rebates for people buying fuel-efficient
vehicles or solar panels (82 percent)
•Establishing programs to teach Americans how
to save energy (72 percent)
•Regulating carbon dioxide as a pollutant (71
percent)
•School curricula to teach children about the
causes, consequences, and potential solutions to
global warming (70 percent)
•Signing an international treaty that requires
the United States to cut emissions of carbon dioxide
90 percent by the year 2050 (61 percent)
•Establishing programs to teach Americans about
global warming (60 percent).
"Surprisingly, majorities of both
Republicans and Democrats support many of these
policies, including renewable energy research, tax
rebates, regulating carbon dioxide, and expanding
offshore drilling for oil and natural gas," said
Anthony Leiserowitz, director of the Yale Project
on Climate Change. "Further, majorities in both
parties support returning revenues from a cap-and-trade
system to American households to offset higher energy
costs, perhaps opening a pathway for Congressional
action."
Sixty percent of Americans, however,
said they have heard "nothing at all" about the
cap-and-trade legislation currently being considered
by Congress. Only 12 percent had heard "a lot."
When cap and trade is explained, 58
percent support the policy, but this support drops
to approximately 40 percent if household energy
costs increase by $15 a month, or 50 cents a day.
Sixty-six percent support cap and trade, however,
if every household were to receive a yearly bonus
of $180 to offset higher energy costs. In addition,
59 percent of Americans said they would likely spend
the bonus on home energy efficiency improvements.
This increases to 71 percent likely if the government
offered to double the bonus, if it was spent on
energy efficiency improvements.
Sixty-two percent said the United
States should make a "medium-" to "large-scale"
effort to reduce global warming, even if doing so
has "moderate" or "large" economic costs. This represents,
however, a 12-point decline since the fall of 2008.
Sixty-nine percent said global warming should be
a "medium" priority to "very high" priority of President
Obama and Congress, while approximately half want
local, state, and federal officials to do more to
address the issue. Both of those results represent
10- to 15-percentage-point declines since the fall
of 2008.
"Most Americans continue to want their
elected leaders at all levels of government to get
on with the job of developing solutions to global
warming," said Edward Maibach, director of the Center
for Climate Change Communication at George Mason
University. "Two out of three also want to see ordinary
citizens like themselves doing more about global
warming."
The results come from a nationally
representative survey of 1,001 American adults,
age 18 and older. The sample was weighted to correspond
with U.S. Census Bureau parameters. The margin of
sampling error is plus or minus 3 percent, with
95 percent confidence. The survey was designed by
researchers at Yale and George Mason universities
and conducted from December 24, 2009, to January
3, 2010, by Knowledge Networks, using an online
research panel of American adults.
Contact: Tara Laskowski tlaskows@gmu.edu
703-993-8815 George Mason University