Increased Number Think Global Warming Is “Exaggerated”

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PRINCETON, NJ -- Although a majority of Americans believe the seriousness of global warming is either correctly portrayed in the news or underestimated, a record-high 41% now say it is exaggerated. This represents the highest level of public skepticism about mainstream reporting on global warming seen in more than a decade of Gallup polling on the subject.

As recently as 2006, significantly more Americans thought the news underestimated the seriousness of global warming than said it exaggerated it, 38% vs. 30%. Now, according to Gallup's 2009 Environment survey, more Americans say the problem is exaggerated rather than underestimated, 41% vs. 28%.

The trend in the "exaggerated" response has been somewhat volatile since 2001, and the previous high point, 38%, came in 2004. Over the next two years, "exaggerated" sentiment fell to 31% and 30%. Still, as noted, the current 41% is the highest since Gallup's trend on this measure began in 1997.

Since 1997, Republicans have grown increasingly likely to believe media coverage of global warming is exaggerated, and that trend continues in the 2009 survey; however, this year marks a relatively sharp increase among independents as well. In just the past year, Republican doubters grew from 59% to 66%, and independents from 33% to 44%, while the rate among Democrats remained close to 20%.

Notably, all of the past year's uptick in cynicism about the seriousness of global warming coverage occurred among Americans 30 and older. The views of 18- to 29-year-olds, the age group generally most concerned about global warming and most likely to say the problem is underestimated, didn't change.

Dampened Concern
Apart from these findings about news coverage of global warming, the March 5-8 poll shows in a similar vein that Americans are a bit less concerned about the seriousness of global warming per se than they have been in recent years.

Six in 10 Americans indicate that they are highly worried about global warming, including 34% who are worried "a great deal" and 26% "a fair amount." Overall worry is similar to points at the start of the decade, but is down from 66% a year ago and from 65% in 2007.

The 2009 Gallup Environment survey measured public concern about eight specific environmental issues. Not only does global warming rank last on the basis of the total percentage concerned either a great deal or a fair amount, but it is the only issue for which public concern dropped significantly in the past year.

Also, compared with last year, fewer Americans believe the effects of global warming have begun to occur. The figure is now 53%, down from 61% in March 2008. At the same time, a record-high 16% say the effects will never occur. (Prior to now, Gallup polling found no more than 11% of Americans saying the effects of global warming would never happen.)

Most Doubt Warming Is a "Serious Threat"
Altogether, 68% of U.S. adults believe the effects of global warming will be manifest at some point in their lifetimes, indicating the public largely believes the problem is real. However, only 38% of Americans, similar to the 40% found in 2008, believe it will pose "a serious threat" to themselves or their own way of life.

This fear that global warming will pose a serious threat in one's lifetime steadily expanded from 25% in 1997 to 40% in 2008. The drop this year to 38% is not statistically significant; however, it is the first time since 1997 that the rate of concern has not increased.

Bottom Line
Americans generally believe global warming is real. That sets the U.S. public apart from the global-warming skeptics who assembled this week in New York City to try to debunk the science behind climate change. At the same time, with only 34% of Americans saying they worry "a great deal" about the problem, most Americans do not view the issue in the same dire terms as the many prominent leaders advancing global warming as an issue.

Importantly, Gallup's annual March update on the environment shows a drop in public concern about global warming across several different measures, suggesting that the global warming message may have lost some footing with Americans over the past year. Gallup has documented declines in public concern about the environment at times when other issues, such as a major economic downturn or a national crisis like 9/11, absorbed Americans' attention. To some extent that may be true today, given the troubling state of the U.S. economy. However, the solitary drop in concern this year about global warming, among the eight specific environmental issues Gallup tested, suggests that something unique may be happening with the issue.

Certainly global warming has received tremendous attention this decade, including with Al Gore's Academy Award-winning documentary "An Inconvenient Truth." It is not clear whether the troubled economy has drawn attention away from the global warming message or whether other factors are at work. It will be important to see whether the 2009 findings hold up in next year's update of the annual environmental survey.

Survey Methods
Results are based on telephone interviews with 1,012 national adults, aged 18 and older, conducted March 5-8, 2009. For results based on the total sample of national adults, one can say with 95% confidence that the maximum margin of sampling error is ±3 percentage points.

Interviews are conducted with respondents on land-line telephones (for respondents with a land-line telephone) and cellular phones (for respondents who are cell-phone only).

In addition to sampling error, question wording and practical difficulties in conducting surveys can introduce error or bias into the findings of public opinion polls.

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Mar 11 05:20 PM US/Eastern
A leading US senator warned on Wednesday that deferring potentially costly actions to combat climate change because of the global economic slump amounted to "a mutual suicide pact."

"Climate change is not governed by a recession, it's governed by scientific facts about what's happening to Earth. And you either accept the realities of the science or you don't," said Democratic Senator John Kerry.

He spoke after some of his colleagues argued that the United States should not impose a cap-and-trade system for so-called greenhouse gases blamed for global warming because it amounts to a painful tax during a deep downturn.

"You don't enter a mutual suicide pact because the economy is having a hard time right now," Kerry said after meeting with UN Secretary Ban Ki-moon seven months before global climate change talks in Denmark's capital.

"You certainly have room to negotiate at what the rate and schedule is within that, but it doesn't mean you can sit around and do nothing," said Kerry.

But the Massachusetts lawmaker and onetime presidential hopeful seemed to douse hopes that the United States would arrive in Copenhagen with the US Congress having already passed sweeping legislation to curb emissions.

He said the House of Representatives would likely pass its measure in June and that key Senate committees could act "before the summer" on legislation but warned that the whole Senate would have "a hard time getting that done."

Kerry said there would be enough progress to give Copenhagen negotiators "a very clear vision" of US plans and said foreign leaders he had spoken to had indicated "that will satisfy" the world of US action on the issue.

Key lawmakers had said earlier this year that they hoped to have sweeping legislation to fight climate unveiled by May and certainly done by the December talks amid hopes of forging a global agreement.

Kerry's remarks came after Republican Senator Lamar Alexander, who sits on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, warned against imposing a cap-and-trade system because it amounts to a painful tax.

"Now is not the time to put a national sales tax on every electric bill and every gasoline purchase," Alexander said of cap-and-trade, which aims to create financial incentives to fight pollution.

President Barack Obama favors the approach, which sets a cap on the total pollutants companies can emit and then forces heavy polluters to buy credits from entities that pollute less.

Cap-and-trade, already in practice in the European Union, is likely to be reinforced at UN climate talks in Copenhagen this December as the preferred strategy for slashing "greenhouse gases" blamed for climate change.

Energy Secretary Stephen Chu was pressed about the Obama administration's aims for the carbon market at a hearing of the Senate Budget Committee.

The Nobel laureate scientist did not go into details, other than to note that cap-and-trade proposals feature in Obama's proposed 3.55-trillion-dollar budget and would provide the framework "to make our economy less carbon-intensive, and less dependent on oil."

But Kent Conrad, the Budget Committee's Democratic chairman, fretted over the impact of Obama's budget on both companies and poorer people if utilities pass on the costs of government pollution permits to their customers.

"The budget as written probably can't pass here," Conrad warned Chu, demanding "flexibility" on how the government intends to offset the costs attached to a cap-and-trade system.

Republican Senator Mike Enzi also warned Chu about the scheme's impact at a time of deep economic distress, saying: "Cap-and-trade is a tax and that tax will be passed on to the consumer."

Alexander, Enzi and other senators from both political parties have urged the White House first to increase the government's support for nuclear power and so-called "clean coal" before instituting an EU-style market for polluters.


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[Xray]

(Global Warming Is “Exaggerated”)

No shit.

[WhiteCrowUK]

I think global warming is a problem, but agree some places do seem to overboy the evidence, making people think the problem isn't anywhere near as big.