By Yanni Psareas, Young Conservatives for Carbon Dividends
As extreme droughts and flash floods began challenging our state earlier this year, three polls were conducted – two by Republican pollsters, and one by Florida Atlantic University’s Center for Environmental Studies — to understand what Floridians think about climate change. For those of us working in environmental and energy policy in the state, the responses from Republicans were striking.
Having worked for more than three years as the Florida state director for a right-of-center energy and climate organization, I know first-hand how much many conservatives in the state care about our environmental challenges. Even so, these recent polls defied my expectations. They show, as one pollster put it, that “Florida’s Republican base is more environmentally conscious than arguably any other red state in the country.”
All three polls demonstrate that significant proportions of Republicans understand climate change is happening and are concerned about the impacts on day-to-day life. According to the recent poll by Spry Strategies, a majority of Florida Republicans are concerned with the costs related to increasing flooding from sea level rise and extreme weather.
Public Opinion Strategies’ poll demonstrates there’s a near-universal understanding among Florida Republican voters that global increases in carbon pollution — much of it from China — is exacerbating local environmental impacts. And the FAU report indicates that 90% of Floridians overall can see that the climate is changing, a significantly higher proportion than virtually all other red states.
What accounts for these results in Florida? We Florida conservatives feel the pain of insurance rates skyrocketing, smell the stench of septic tanks flushed out by flooding, and endure more frequent and more catastrophic storm damage across the state.
There is, though, a crucial explanation on why our concern for the environment has not translated into support for Democrat-led climate policies. Republicans do not want solutions to environmental problems that resemble the Green New Deal, with reckless spending, command-and-control regulations and liberal ideology baked in. It’s simply against who we are.
We prefer a strategy that prioritizes innovation, free choice and the harnessing of the creative powers of the American economy.
We also are concerned with facts that get little attention from the environmental mainstream. For instance, we Republicans are quick to point out that what we do here in the U.S. will not matter in addressing the climate challenge if foreign countries don’t get with the program and cut their own pollution. We know that, as we work to quickly become a cleaner nation, our adversaries are not, which they use to their strategic benefit.
The recent polling shows a consensus among Florida voters resonates with this deeply. People understand weak environmental laws abroad give foreign polluters an edge over U.S. companies, and want China’s pollution practices addressed.
These polls give us a fascinating glimpse of what Floridian Republicans believe. But it’s important to also mention what they don’t spotlight: the work leaders in Florida’s GOP are already doing on the environment, which is significant and growing.
Gov. Ron DeSantis – with Republican leadership and support across the state Legislature — passed a historic environmental package last year that fortifies resilience, water quality and the Everglades. Our Congressional delegation — and notably Reps. Maria Salazar, Carlos Gimenez and Kat Cammack, and Sen. Rick Scott – are advancing bills that promote advanced energy development, conserve land and water, and take on China’s pollution directly. Their efforts to advance environmental policy often go unnoticed, but are underway and set them apart from Republicans in other states.
As a young professional and Republican, I thank those in the GOP who are already leading on these topics, and I encourage my conservative peers to look at the numbers, and be inspired to continue picking up the mantle in addressing Florida’s many environmental challenges.
Yanni Psareas is the regional director for Young Conservatives for Carbon Dividends and political director for the Florida Federation of College Republicans.
The Invading Sea is managed by the FAU Center for Environmental Studies, which conducted one of the climate polls referenced above. If you are interested in submitting an opinion piece to The Invading Sea, email Editor Nathan Crabbe at ncrabbe@fau.edu. Sign up for The Invading Sea newsletter by visiting here.
Mr. Psareas, you are the regional director for Young Conservatives for Carbon Dividends. Why don’t you explain to your fellow climate-concerned Republicans what the real best solution to address climate change actually is; putting the costs associated with carbon pollution back into the product – a carbon fee, which is, after all, where the funds for the ‘Carbon Dividends’ comes from? (It’s right on your website http://www.yccdaction.org/solution) This is your organization and I assume you truely believe in it. Why then do you pull your punches and go into praising Gov. DeSantis for a ‘historic environmental package’ that improves water quality (nice, but not really climate-related) and Everglades restoration (yes, a healthy Everglades does absorb more atmospheric CO2, so is a plus, but without a huge near-term impact). You praise other Republican Members of Congress for their efforts on ‘the environment’ as well but I believe this misleads many readers. ‘Environment’ is not the same as ‘climate change’. You state ‘We prefer a strategy that prioritizes innovation, free choice and the harnessing of the creative powers of the American economy.’ Sounds nice but it doesn’t give any real solution to climate change….and I know you know what the best solution is.
My advice is to try to educate your fellow young Republicans on Real climate solutions, like a carbon fee and dividend with a carbon border adjustment, and then, importantly, ask them to demand that their elected officials listen to them, represent them, and enact federal, state, and local policy that moves us closer to those solutions.
It’s senseless for us in America to use China’s huge carbon pollution problem as an excuse for not cleaning up our own mess. As Americans, we have no control over how China produces its electricity or how much coal it burns. We can do much more in our own country to reduce and eventually eliminate the burning of the fossil fuels that are heating our atmosphere. Americans are heavily involved in improving existing green energy technologies such as solar and wind power and electrical storage, and bringing on new clean sources of energy, like hydrogen and geothermal power, and revamped and safer nuclear power or carbon capture. When the United State focuses its creative ingenuity on a problem, we have a solid track record of creating the sea-changing technologies that the world needs, and clamors for. Finger pointing at China is a waste of time – worse, actually because it creates a mindset that trying to reduce carbon pollution at home is not worth the effort. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Americans produce more carbon per capita than any other country. The only way to mitigate climate change is to reduce the release of carbon . there is no magic bullet of technology to do this . We are at a tipping point reduce or face extinction . The 1.5 C increase is here and will increase. How much the oceans rise and droughts expand is our choice. Blame others and America does nothing is Conservative policy at state and national levels . Stop whining and blaming everyone else or do something.