The main purpose of this ongoing blog will be to track planetary extreme, or record temperatures related to climate change. Any reports I see of ETs will be listed below the main topic of the day. Iâll refer to extreme or record temperatures as ETs (not extraterrestrials).đ
Main Topic: Incentives That Will Make Climate Action Work
Dear Diary. Generally, we as Americans have been spoiled and are not used to hardships of any sort. Our cities and people weren’t bombed to nearly oblivion during WWII as happened to our European counterparts, although we experienced plenty of pain from the loss of our brave men during that war and subsequent conflicts.
After that horrid war we became the dominant superpower for the rest of the 20th century into the 21st and started to get used to and want more creature comforts. Every U.S. President post WWII that has faced the prospect of inflation or product shortages, such as energy and gasoline, has gotten the old election axe because our populace is not willing to put up with even minor hardships compared with those in association with WWII. This happened to Gerald Ford in 1976, Jimmy Carter in 1980, and George Bush in 1992.
Due to the “Great Recession” housing bust of 2007/8 there was wholescale governmental political party change with Democrats taking control under the presidential leadership of Barak Obama in 2009. Will the same happen to the Democrats under Joe Biden in 2022 and 2024 because of gasoline price inflation and/or some other hardship?
If we are to right our climate ship before 2030, I pray not given the current state of Republican drill baby drill desires. What is needed are policies that keep a high standard of living that simultaneously transition the economy towards renewables rapidly. The following Fast Energy Company article describes what can be done using the old incentive carrot in a stick approach for change:
- 12-01-21
Americans support climate change policies, if they give them incentives to change
People prefer policies with incentives rather than punishmentsâbut have greater tolerance for disincentives when they applied to businesses.
Images: johan63/iStock, Marija Jokic/iStock
BY JANET K. SWIM AND NATHANIEL GEIGER3 MINUTE READ
As the Biden administration tries to build support for new climate and energy policies, a set of studies offers some insights that could help them appeal to the widest audience.
We are social scientists who examine how people think about climate change solutions. In the studies, we explored how the public responds to different types of policies and why some are likely to be more popular than others.
For example, which is better: incentives to cut emissions, such as rebates for installing solar panels, or disincentives, like a carbon tax? Does it matter whether those policies target individuals or businesses? What about policies that would reduce energy use or change energy sources from fossil to renewable energy?
Overall, we found people support climate change policies, but they have preferences among different types based on the policiesâ anticipated environmental, economic, and social impacts.
THE WHO, WHAT, AND HOW OF CLIMATE POLICY
We used two different measures in two separate studies to assess U.S. residentsâ reactions to a set of climate and energy policy types. The 265 participants ranged in age from 18 to 80 and had an approximately equal likelihood of identifying themselves as Republican, Democrat, or independent.
These policies varied in three crucial ways:
- How they promoted change: through incentives, such as grants or rebates to encourage low-carbon actions; or disincentives, such as fees or taxes to discourage high-carbon actions.
- Whom they targeted: businesses or individuals.
- What they targeted: energy supply, such as switching to renewable sources; or energy demand, such as promoting energy efficiency and conservation.
The participants shared their preferences, but they also estimated the environmental, economic, and social effects they thought each policy would have. Understanding the influence those estimates have on the participantsâ views could help policymakers make less-popular policies more palatable.
LESSON 1: INCENTIVES OVER DISINCENTIVES
We found that people preferred policies with incentives rather than punishmentsâespecially when the policies applied to individuals, but also for businesses.
They said they thought incentives would be better for the environment and have more economic and social net benefits than disincentives would.
However, we found greater tolerance of disincentives when they applied to businesses than when they affected individuals.
This tolerance was not a result of impressions of effects on the economyâin both cases, the participants anticipated greater economic benefits from incentives than from disincentives.
Instead, participants appeared to think that trying to change individualsâ behaviorsâbut not businessesâ practicesâwith disincentives would have less positive social impact and be less effective. For example, about one-third of the respondents thought the disincentives for individuals would have more social harms than benefits, while only about 10% thought the same for other policy options.
LESSON 2: CLEAN ENERGY IS BETTER THAN LESS ENERGY
People also preferred policies that would change the supply of energy by increasing renewable energy and decreasing fossil fuels more than policies that would decrease the amount of energy people use.
The study participants thought increasing renewable energy and decreasing fossil fuel use would have greater economic and social benefits than decreasing the amount of energy used. For example, 87% indicated there would be more economic benefits than harms from energy supply policies, while 77% indicated the same for energy reduction policies.
We found that the participantsâ political leanings had surprisingly little effect on relative preferences among all eight policies.
Our previous research with University of Oklahoma postdoctoral fellow Lizbeth Benson also found that environmental benefits, and the anticipated economic consequences, considering both benefits and harms, affected which policies people support. Moreover, the anticipated human impact of climate policiesâthese could include health, food, safety, and human well-beingâwas even more strongly associated with climate policy support.
THE LIMITATIONS OF CLIMATE POPULARISM
It may not always make sense for politicians to promote the climate policy with the greatest public support.
For example, enacting some policies that penalize individuals for actions that emit a lot of greenhouse gases may be necessary to reach the worldâs climate goals, despite their relative unpopularity.
Of course, a climate policy that doesnât pass will not reduce carbon emissions at all.
Our work also suggests a possible path forward for promoting less-popular policies, such as those with disincentives for individuals, or that reduce energy use. We found that these policies are less popular because people tend to believe they will be less effective and have less of a positive social impact.
Changing policies to increase their positive social impactâa carbon tax that rebates the proceeds to citizens is an exampleâcan help win public support.
Communication strategies can focus on successes to illustrate that people working together to reduce their energy can effectively reduce emissions. For instance, communities can learn from, and be inspired by, cities that have cut their emissions.
Janet K. Swim is a professor of psychology at Penn State and Nathaniel Geiger is an assistant professor of communication science at Indiana University.
Here are some âETâsâ reported from Wednesday:
Here is more new November 2021 climatology:
Here is more climate and weather news from Thursday:
(As usual, this will be a fluid post in which more information gets added during the day as it crosses my radar, crediting all who have put it on-line. Items will be archived on this site for posterity. In most instances click on the pictures of each tweet to see each article. The most noteworthy items will be listed first.)
Now here are some of todayâs articles and notes on the horrid COVID-19 pandemic:
(If you like these posts and my work please contribute via the PayPal widget, which has recently been added to this site. Thanks in advance for any support.)
Guy Walton âThe Climate Guyâ