Issue: Climate Policy

Majorities of likely voters support the climate investment and tax incentives of Build Back Better. 70% of all likely voters support investments to make homes, buildings, and schools more energy efficiency (86% support among Democrats, 54% among Republians). 67% support investments in clean energy research. 65% support tax credits for clean energy projects. 63% support clean energy performance incentives for utilities. 62% support investments in frontline communities. 57% support creating a Civilian Climate Corps. 57% support investments to make electric vehicles more affordable. 54% support phasing out coal, oil, and gas.             

This post includes a roundup of climate + environment headlines from this week’s public polls, good data points to highlight, and a full roundup with key takeaways from each poll – including lots of timely new polling on the Build Back Better plan.
HEADLINES

Yahoo + YouGov – Americans support Biden’s “$3.5 trillion infrastructure plan” by double digits, and a plurality support using the budget reconciliation process to overcome a Republican filibuster (Topline, Crosstabs)
POLITICO + Morning Consult – Voters widely support tax breaks for renewable energy in the reconciliation bill, even when it’s framed as a Democratic proposal (Topline, Crosstabs)
Data for Progress + Invest in America – Voters support the Build Back Better plan by a two-to-one margin after reading an explanation of its components; grid modernization continues to be one of the plan’s most popular provisions (Release, Topline)
LCV + Climate Power – Majorities of voters across Democratic-held U.S. Senate battleground states (AZ, CO, GA, NH + NV) support the Build Back Better plan after a brief description, and majorities also reject the idea of trimming the bill down; top messages focus on jobs, pollution/health, and lowering utility bills (Deck, Memo, AZ Topline, CO Topline, GA Topline, NH Topline, NV Topline)
Navigator – Climate is rising as a national priority; two in five voters say that weather in their community this summer has been different from past years, and most who have experienced unusual weather cite climate change as the reason (Release, Deck, Topline)
Data for Progress – “Green jobs” are a confusing concept for voters (Memo)
Yale Program on Climate Change Communication – Moderates have similar reactions to “climate change” and “extreme weather” as the rationale for emergency preparedness actions and policies, but there are benefits to using “extreme weather” with conservative audiences (Article)

The Climate Reality Project and Citizens’ Climate Lobby were interested in knowing whether informing people about existing bipartisan governmental bodies (e.g., the Climate Solutions Caucus in the US House of Representatives) would make the public, in particular moderates and conservatives, both think and act differently about climate. Their hypothesis was that signaling bipartisanship and governmental provenance in an organization could increase enthusiasm about climate action by showing people that powerful interests could unite to tackle the issue.
They find that messaging about government initiatives (as opposed to business and NGO efforts) significantly increases peoples’ sense of efficacy for climate action, which then translates to increased support for personal action-taking. Among conservative men, emphasizing bipartisan government action increases their support for personal action by 30% compared to the bipartisan NGO condition due to raising their second-order beliefs. In other words, telling conservative men that bipartisan governmental groups exist to work on climate change reduces their propensity to say that the average Republican opposes climate action by the government. The researchers do not find any evidence that emphasizing bipartisan government action increases respondents’ optimism about the climate crisis.

This post includes a roundup of climate + environment headlines from this week’s public polls, good data points to highlight, and a full roundup with key takeaways from each poll – including new polls on the Build Back Better budget, a study on the impact of language in the natural gas debate, and extreme weather polling.
HEADLINES

Navigator – Specific details engender broad support for the Build Back Better budget, even when it’s framed as a Democratic bill (Release, Slide Deck, Topline)
Washington Post/ABC News – The Build Back Better budget has slim majority support when described as $3.5 trillion in spending for “expanded social programs, educational assistance and programs to address climate change” (Topline, Crosstabs)
No Labels & American Action Network – Opposition polls claim that Americans want to pause on the kind of government spending included in the Build Back Better budget (Axios Article on No Labels Poll, No Labels Release, American Action Network Release)
Yale Program on Climate Change Communication – Language used to describe gas as an energy source is hugely impactful in shaping opinions; Americans have positive attitudes about “natural gas,” but not about methane (Academic Paper, YPCCC Article)
Economist/YouGov – Americans continue to attribute recent extreme weather events more to climate change than natural patterns; nearly one in four say they were personally impacted by Eastern seaboard hurricanes (Topline, Crosstabs)