Bipartisan support to cut carbon emissions - and to fund it

[Skjellyfetti]

Fully 70 percent say the federal government should require limits to greenhouse gases from existing power plants, the focus of a new rule announced Monday by the Environmental Protection Agency. An identical 70 percent supports requiring states to limit the amount of greenhouse gas emissions within their borders.

Democrats and Republicans are in rare agreement on the issue. Fifty-seven percent of Republicans, 76 percent among independents and 79 percent of Democrats support state-level limits on greenhouse gas emissions. Strong tea party supporters are most resistant to limits on emissions by states and power plants; 50 percent say the federal government should impose caps, while 45 percent say they should not.

The cross-party agreement extends to a willingness to pay for such limits with higher energy bills, a flashpoint for debate and a key area of uncertainty in new regulations. Asked whether Washington should still go forward with limits if they "significantly lowered greenhouse gases but raised your monthly energy expenses by 20 dollars a month," 63 percent of respondents say yes, including 51 percent of Republicans, 64 percent of independents and 71 percent of Democrats.

Americans living in coal-heavy states are supportive of limiting greenhouse gas emissions in the poll, even as their states will be forced to make bigger adjustments to meet the EPA's new emissions targets. Among those in states where a majority of electricity is produced by burning coal, 69 percent say the government should place limits on greenhouse gas emissions. Support is a similar 71 percent in states where less than half of electricity comes from coal.

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[89Hen]

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/03/us/ca ... .html?_r=0

It took little time for Alison Lundergan Grimes, the Democrat who is challenging Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican minority leader, in the most high-profile Senate race this year, to distance herself from the Obama administration’s proposal for sharp cuts to emissions from power plants.

[HI54UNI]

Raise your bill by $20 a month? Like that is all it will be.

I wish they would ask how the people feel about freezing to death when it gets cold and there is no electricity.

[JohnStOnge]

One thing I wondered about is if American coal producers could just sell their product overseas. There is a certainly a market for it.

I'm not surprised by the poll results. To most Americans "science" is like a sacred black box. If they're told "this is what the scientists say" they go with it. And for the most part it's reasonable. The results of the practice of science have, overall, been good. They're not going to get into stuff like asking questions about creating "virtual earths" with models to "experiment" on because climate science, by it's nature, can't do real experimenting. To most "science" is "science." They're not going to think about the difference between something like medical science and something like climate science. And they're probably not going to get into questioning the conclusions about how a particular climate change is going to be a net negative.