Cheap and Clean: How Americans Think about Energy in the Age of Global Warming

by Stephen Ansolabehere, David M. Konisky

Overview

How Americans make energy choices, why they think locally (not globally), and how this can shape U.S. energy and climate change policy.

How do Americans think about energy? Is the debate over fossil fuels highly partisan and ideological? Does public opinion about fossil fuels and alternative energies divide along the fault between red states and blue states? And how much do concerns about climate change weigh on their opinions? In Cheap and Clean, Stephen Ansolabehere and David Konisky show that Americans are more pragmatic than ideological in their opinions about energy alternatives, more unified than divided about their main concerns, and more local than global in their approach to energy.

Drawing on extensive surveys they designed and conducted over the course of a decade (in conjunction with MIT's Energy Initiative), Ansolabehere and Konisky report that beliefs about the costs and environmental harms associated with particular fuels drive public opinions about energy. People approach energy choices as consumers, and what is most important to them is simply that energy be cheap and clean. Most of us want energy at low economic cost and with little social cost (that is, minimal health risk from pollution). The authors also find that although environmental concerns weigh heavily in people's energy preferences, these concerns are local and not global. Worries about global warming are less pressing to most than worries about their own city's smog and toxic waste. With this in mind, Ansolabehere and Konisky argue for policies that target both local pollutants and carbon emissions (the main source of global warming). The local and immediate nature of people's energy concerns can be the starting point for a new approach to energy and climate change policy.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780262321075
Publisher:	MIT Press
Publication date:	08/22/2014
Series:	The MIT Press
Sold by:	Penguin Random House Publisher Services
Format:	eBook
Pages:	272
File size:	6 MB
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Stephen Ansolabehere is Professor of Government at Harvard University and coauthor of The End of Inequality and other books.

David M. Konisky is Associate Professor in the School of Public and Environmental Affairs and the coeditor of Failed Promises: Evaluating the Federal Government's Response to Environmental Justice (MIT Press).

What People are Saying About This

John Deutch

Ansolabehere and Konisky point out that the attitudes of the American public to energy technologies ultimately will determine our energy future. They give the reader a fascinating report: the public's preferences are based on perceived costs and harms. These choices have been remarkably stable over time and not predictable by the popular variables of gender or party except on the vital issue of climate change. The public seems to be better informed than our political leaders about our energy future.

Thomas Dietz

If you are concerned about climate change, energy, or the environment, you should read Cheap and Clean. It is the most thought-provoking book on energy I have read in years. Ansolabehere and Konisky are lucid writers, their arguments are persuasive and their message is surprisingly hopeful. Researchers will be challenged by their approach, and policy makers can find considerable wisdom here.

Robert Duffy

Cheap and Clean makes an important contribution to our understanding of public opinion and energy. The authors provide interesting insights into how Americans view energy choice and the role of partisan and demographic differences in explaining attitudes on energy. This book is original, engaging, and highly readable.

Eric R.A.N. Smith

Cheap and Clean is the most important book yet written on how Americans think about energy issues. The authors' Consumer Model of energy and energy policy preferences is a breakthrough in our understanding of how people think about these issues. The book is essential reading for scholars who study public opinion and energy as well as for policy advocates and policy makers in the field.

Endorsement

Cheap and Clean makes an important contribution to our understanding of public opinion and energy. The authors provide interesting insights into how Americans view energy choice and the role of partisan and demographic differences in explaining attitudes on energy. This book is original, engaging, and highly readable.

—Robert Duffy, Professor and Chair of the Political Science Department, Colorado State University; coauthor of Integrating Climate, Energy, and Air Pollution Policies

From the Publisher

Ansolabehere and Konisky point out that the attitudes of the American public to energy technologies ultimately will determine our energy future. They give the reader a fascinating report: the public's preferences are based on perceived costs and harms. These choices have been remarkably stable over time and not predictable by the popular variables of gender or party except on the vital issue of climate change. The public seems to be better informed than our political leaders about our energy future.

—John Deutch, Institute Professor, MIT; former Director of Energy Research, Undersecretary of Energy, U.S. Department of Energy

If you are concerned about climate change, energy, or the environment, you should read Cheap and Clean. It is the most thought-provoking book on energy I have read in years. Ansolabehere and Konisky are lucid writers, their arguments are persuasive and their message is surprisingly hopeful. Researchers will be challenged by their approach, and policy makers can find considerable wisdom here.

—Thomas Dietz, Professor and Founding Director, Environmental Science and Policy Program, Michigan State University

Cheap and Clean is the most important book yet written on how Americans think about energy issues. The authors' Consumer Model of energy and energy policy preferences is a breakthrough in our understanding of how people think about these issues. The book is essential reading for scholars who study public opinion and energy as well as for policy advocates and policy makers in the field.

—Eric R.A.N. Smith, Professor of Political Science, University of California, Santa Barbara

Cheap and Clean makes an important contribution to our understanding of public opinion and energy. The authors provide interesting insights into how Americans view energy choice and the role of partisan and demographic differences in explaining attitudes on energy. This book is original, engaging, and highly readable.

—Robert Duffy, Professor and Chair of the Political Science Department, Colorado State University; coauthor of Integrating Climate, Energy, and Air Pollution Policies

Editorial Reviews

09/15/2014
Ansolabehere (The End of Inequality) professor of government at Harvard, and Konisky (Superfund's Future), professor of public policy at Georgetown, guide readers to a single conclusion in this rigorous study of the nation's attitudes toward our energy supply. The authors base their work on a decade-long series of surveys that convincingly demonstrate that American citizens have a clear preference for energy that is both cheap and clean, regardless of its source. They further show that concerns over reducing local pollution outweigh price considerations. After they have driven home the first two points, the authors turn to policy implications for attempts at abating climate change. Americans, although concerned about local environmental harms are, as it turns out, unwilling to pay "substantially higher energy prices in order to substantially reduce carbon emissions." Yet, what Americans may support and Californians have already supported is legislation pitched as pollution control. In-depth statistical analyses make it clear that this work is intended for policy wonks, academics, and others who work on these issues at a high level, but it should nonetheless prove to be an important contribution to the ongoing debate over energy and environmental policy. (Sept.)

Publishers Weekly