Ideology and Value Determinants of Public Support for Energy Policies in the U.S.: A Focus on Western States

Abstract

Energy policy is often a contentious issue in the U.S. in the areas of infrastructure, conservation, and price discrimination. From the siting of new pipelines, conservation regulations, and variable pricing based on times and usage, many policies have been met by intense opposition as well as support from a variety of sources. In this context, this study examines individual-level attributes (e.g., political ideology, environmental values, and demographic characteristics) that lead to support for or opposition to infrastructure, conservation, and price discrimination policies. The identification of demographic and value correlates of energy policy preferences is important for the successful development of energy policies. Data from 2019 random household surveys in the U.S. western states of California, Idaho, Oregon and Washington are used to examine the variation in views on a variety of energy policies. Multivariate analyses reveal that those with more liberal political ideology and people holding stronger pro-environmental values (as measured by the New Ecological Paradigm) were more likely to support conservation campaigns, energy efficiency, funding for renewable energy technology and price discrimination policies than those who held more conservative views. Several demographic variables also have a significant impact on support for or opposition to policies concerning infrastructure, conservation, and price discrimination. Younger people and people with higher levels of formal education are more likely to support voluntary energy conservation campaigns and increased funding for research into renewable energy technologies, and people with higher incomes are more supportive of requiring high-energy efficiency standards in new construction. Finally, state residency independently affected policy preferences with Idahoans’ views more consistent with political conservatives and those lower on the NEP than residents of the other three western states. These findings should be useful to policy makers as they work toward the development of energy policies.

Comparing public support for nuclear and wind energy in Washington State

“…Regarding the control variables, Env has a statistically significant negative effect on nuclear support, which suggests that those with pro-environment preferences support wind over nuclear. This is consistent with the finding of the literature [ 25 , 66 ]. Urban_rural is not statistically significant, which means that urban residents do not differ from rural residents regarding their support for nuclear over wind.…”

“…Likewise, Democrats are more supportive of wind over nuclear than Republicans. This is consistent with the literature that finds that Democrats/liberals are more willing to pay for renewable energy and a carbon tax than Republicans/conservatives [ 66 , 68 , 69 ]. On the other hand, male and high-educated people support nuclear over wind.…”

“…This is consistent with previous findings that female, higher-educated, or young people are more supportive of renewable energy [23,24]. We did not find a systematic association between income level and support for nuclear over wind, which is consistent with Bergmann et al (2006) and Allen Wolters et al (2020) [23,66]. In addition, religion and race do not affect the level of support for nuclear over wind.…”

“…conservatives [66,68,69]. On the other hand, male and high-educated people support nuclear over wind.…”

Vision for a sustainable energy transition and decarbonization: A case study of students surveyed at a Chilean University

“…The 10% higher willingness to change personal lifestyle in favor of reducing the carbon footprint indicated by liberals as compared to conservatives might help to understand liberals’ underlying motivations of the support towards a fast RET, and has already been reported in a similar study [ 38 ]. These results are related to disaggregated approval ratings by political tendency, and are consistent with documented evidence, as the liberal political ideology has been estimated to support pro-environmental policies 13% more than that of the conservative ideology [ 88 ]. Conservative ideology has a greater preference for conventional energy sources and traditional infrastructure, which is probably related to skepticism and denial towards anthropogenic climate change [ 38 , 88 , 89 ].…”