Seventh Wave of FAU’s Florida Climate Resilience Poll Tracks Evolution of Florida Public Opinion
BOCA RATON, Fla., Oct. 19, 2022 /PRNewswire/ — Newswise — Seven sequenced surveys performed by researchers at Florida Atlantic University since October 2019 are portray a complete image of Floridians’ local weather resilience attitudes throughout a interval of significantly dynamic political, financial and environmental occasions.
Climate change seems to have emerged as an abiding and cross-cutting challenge that in Florida, a minimum of, has grown in significance regardless of an explosive array of different occasions competing for public consideration.
Belief in local weather change amongst Florida adults has climbed to greater than 90 p.c, together with 84 p.c of self-identified Republicans, in keeping with a brand new evaluation of the seven sequenced surveys. This apparently rising consensus might clarify authorities actions right this moment and within the coming years. For instance, Florida’s Republican governor and legislature voted into regulation greater than $400 million of climate-related mitigation and resilience funding in 2022. It is just not clear if public opinion is main such actions, or vice versa.
For occasion, the 62 p.c of Floridians (51 p.c of Republicans) who right this moment favor growing the state’s photo voltaic power manufacturing seem to have skilled a big enhance over previous surveys. Driving this spike is a noteworthy convergence of public opinion throughout earnings teams: in previous FAU surveys, parsing responses to the photo voltaic power query by earnings revealed a cut up of 10 to twenty share factors, whereas now that vary is just roughly 5 factors.
Other necessary survey questions show extra stability over time, however as with the photo voltaic power query, are indicative of surprisingly widespread assist. For occasion, 71 p.c of Floridians (57 p.c of Republicans) now endorse instructing the science of local weather change in Ok-12 school rooms, and 42 p.c (40 p.c of Republicans) are keen to pay an additional month-to-month $10 infrastructure tax to cut back local weather change impacts. These Florida ranges belie the sturdy partisan cut up noticed elsewhere.
At the nationwide stage, for instance, lower than one-half of surveyed Republicans imagine in local weather change, and fewer than one-third in a human trigger, in keeping with a latest survey by the Pew Research Center. The corresponding Florida numbers noticed on this survey are 58 p.c and 38 p.c, respectively.
“At least in Florida, climate change may no longer be an effective wedge campaign issue for the upcoming November elections, and beyond,” mentioned Colin Polsky, Ph.D., a professor and director of the Center for Environmental Studies, FAU Charles E. Schmidt College of Science.
During the interval of the seven surveys, public opinion about local weather change was possible formed by the Trump Administration’s 2017 determination to withdraw the United States from the United Nations 2015 Paris Climate Accord. Similarly, the general public significance of local weather change was possible diminished in response to the sudden 2020 society-wide upheaval linked with the COVID-19 pandemic and financial crises.
“More recently, climate change has been in the public spotlight this year more than perhaps ever before,” mentioned Polsky. “Since the February Russian invasion of Ukraine, officials worldwide have been struggling to supply energy markets without breaking their commitments to reduce fossil fuel consumption.”
The U.S. Congress in August handed the largest-ever nationwide invoice (the Inflation Reduction Act) to incentivize actions to fight local weather change. In late September, nearly all of Florida’s 20 million residents needed to put together for a fast-developing, and in the end devastating, Hurricane Ian that ultimately made landfall as nearly a Category 5 storm. Hurricane Ian could possibly be Florida’s costliest storm ever with an estimated $47 billion in insured losses, in keeping with CoreLogic.
“Florida may be the first domino to fall of Republican-led states taking robust climate actions despite the national party’s distancing of themselves from the climate issue,” mentioned Polsky. “Inspection of the upcoming November elections and exit polls, and beyond, will test this hypothesis, both in Florida and at the national level.”
For extra information, survey outcomes and full cross-tabulations, go to www.ces.fau.edu/ces-bepi/ or contact Polsky at [email protected].
– FAU –
The survey was performed in English from Sept. 1-7, 2022. The pattern consisted of 1,400 Floridians, ages 18 and older, with a margin of error of +/- 2.62 p.c. The information was collected utilizing a web-based panel supplied by GreatBlue Research. Responses for your complete pattern had been weighted to regulate for age, race, earnings, schooling and gender in keeping with 2020 U.S. Bureau of the Census information. It is necessary to do not forget that subsets carry with them increased margins of error, because the pattern measurement is decreased.
About Florida Atlantic University: Florida Atlantic University, established in 1961, formally opened its doorways in 1964 because the fifth public college in Florida. Today, the University serves greater than 30,000 undergraduate and graduate college students throughout six campuses situated alongside the southeast Florida coast. In latest years, the University has doubled its analysis expenditures and outpaced its friends in scholar achievement charges. Through the coexistence of entry and excellence, FAU embodies an modern mannequin the place conventional achievement gaps vanish. FAU is designated a Hispanic-serving establishment, ranked as a prime public college by U.S. News & World Report and a High Research Activity establishment by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching. For extra information, go to www.fau.edu.
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