“Climategate” and reports of errors in a U.N. report on climate change may be having some effect on how the public views global warming.

According to Gallup’s annual update of American attitudes toward the environment, 48 percent of Americans now believe that the seriousness of global warming is generally exaggerated. That’s up from 41 percent a year ago and 31 percent in 1997, when the polling company first asked the question.

A majority of Americans still believe global warming is real, but the number is falling. According to the poll, Americans are less convinced that humans are causing climate change. In 2003, 61 percent of Americans said temperature increases were due to human activity. Now, a “significantly diminished” 50 percent say humans are to blame, and 46 percent think not.

There is some evidence in the poll that the news stories on errors in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report and the controversy over emails hacked from a prominent climate research institution in the United Kingdom are weakening Americans' belief that there is a consensus about the causes of global warming. "Roughly half of Americans now say that 'most scientists believe that global warming is occurring,' down from 65 percent in recent years," according to Gallup.

The governors have officially joined the fight against EPA’s move to regulate carbon dioxide.

Governors from 18 states – only one a Democrat – wrote to congressional leaders that EPA’s effort would “increase the cost of electricity and gasoline prices, manufactured products, and ultimately harm the competitiveness of the U.S. economy.”

“We strongly urge Congress to stop harmful EPA regulation of greenhouse-gas emissions that could damage those vital interests,” the letter states, in Dow Jones.

Read more...

A mostly Republican group of 20 state and territorial governors is urging Congress to block EPA’s ability to regulate greenhouse gas emissions.

A letter Wednesday from the governors – 18 Republicans and two Democrats – to House and Senate leaders alleges that planned EPA rules to limit heat-trapping emissions would harm their state economies.

“We feel compelled to guard against a regulatory approach that would increase the cost of electricity and gasoline prices, manufactured products, and ultimately harm the competitiveness of the U.S. economy,” states the letter to Democratic and GOP leadership.

Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.) has provided Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) a wish list of items for climate change legislation that includes a lengthy delay before greenhouse gas limits are imposed on industrial facilities.

Levin is a pivotal voice on climate policy. His state includes Detroit automakers and other manufacturing interests that fear the costs of climate legislation and its effects on their competitiveness.

In a March 5 letter to Kerry – who is playing a leading role in Senate climate negotiations –  Levin calls for a delay of at least 10 years before industrial plants face regulations. Levin argues that a further delay should be provided “if important trade provisions to assure a level playing field are not included and fully implemented.”

A bipartisan group of lawmakers introduced a bill today to provide homeowners and businesses with low-interest loans to make energy efficiency improvements to cut their energy use.

The measure would grant $4.9 billion in loan authority to the Rural Utilities Services, which finances rural electric utilities. The RUS loans to the electric co-ops would be zero percent interest, and given on the condition that the co-ops would in turn make low-interest loans to their customers for things like installing insulation, replacing old heating and cooling systems and repairing leaky roofs.

The co-op loans could not exceed interest rates of greater than 3 percent.

“This bill provides for energy conservation, job creation and cost-effective upgrades that will improve consumers’ quality of life,” House Majority Leader Jim Clyburn (D-S.C.) said in a statement.

As expected, the United Nations today announced that an outside review of the embattled UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change will be conducted by a scientific body called the InterAcademy Council.

The Council, based in the Netherlands, is an umbrella group for national science academies in various nations, including the U.S.

Climate skeptics – including several Capitol Hill lawmakers – have pounced on errors in the IPCC’s massive 2007 report on global warming. But the IPCC defended its work even as it announced the new review.

The League of Conservation Voters launched an effort Wednesday to play up oil industry contributions to the conservative lawmaker.

The White House Office of Management and Budget has begun reviewing a final EPA-Transportation Department joint rule that sets tougher vehicle mileage targets and creates first-time tailpipe standards for greenhouse gases.

The plan covers model years 2012-2016, setting a mileage standard that ultimately reaches 35.5 miles per gallon and a carbon dioxide emissions standard that reaches 250 grams per mile fleet-wide.

OMB received the final rule from the agencies Monday, according to its website, and the agencies hope to issue the measure at the end of this month or the beginning of April.

The AARP, the powerful senior’s lobby, likes Cantwell-Collins approach to climate change.

The group sent a letter to Sens. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) and Susan Collins (R-Maine) on Tuesday calling their so-called cap-and-dividend approach to climate legislation a “thoughtful, bipartisan approach” that reduces carbon dioxide emissions but also protects consumers.

AARP had expressed concern that House-passed climate legislation, which uses an economy-wide cap-and-trade system to cut emissions, didn’t provide enough protections to consumers. Ben wrote a piece explaining the Cantwell-Collins approach.