Californians sour on green policies

In the abstract, people will support all manner of vague policy proposals. But for many of those same people, what matters most is the obvious follow-up question: Are you willing to pay for it?

The Public Policy Institute of California recently highlighted an example of mismatched responses from a survey of Californians.

“About six in ten adults (62%) and likely voters (60%) favor a state law that requires 100 percent of the state’s electricity to come from renewable sources by 2045,” reported the nonpartisan research organization recently.

It’s not too hard to figure out why. Such a law sounds green, it sounds progressive, and in a state like California, such a combination can go very far without much scrutiny.

But then came the follow-up question and suddenly you get a very different impression of where Californians actually stand.

As described by PPIC, “when asked if they would be willing to pay more for electricity generated by renewable sources, such as solar or wind energy, majorities of adults and likely voters say they would not be willing.”

Indeed, just 40% of Californians said they were willing to pay more for electricity. As soon as the basic follow-up question was asked, the sizable majority in support of California’s green agenda vanished.

Of course, most Democrats (58%) are still OK with paying more for electricity and therefore by extension requiring other people to pay more for electricity. But even larger proportions of Republicans (86%) and independents (60%) are not alright with this.

But for the last decade, California’s Democratic political leadership has acted as though it had the full support of the people to pursue costly and ineffective green energy policies.

We say ineffective given the plain fact that for as expensive as energy now is in California in pursuit of green dreams, there hasn’t been much tangible benefit to the goal of impacting climate change.

As researchers from the University of Chicago reported in 2022, “the increase in emissions caused by wildfires in a single year is close to double the emissions reductions achieved over 16 years.”

The ineffectual nature of California’s energy policies are why advocates of California going green fall back on specious arguments, like the idea that California must continue inflicting higher energy costs on its residents to inspire other states and even the world to follow suit.

That might make wealthy environmentalist donors swoon, but the only practical impact of this approach to “leadership” has been a more expensive California.

It’s time to recalibrate our energy policies in a more reasonable and balanced manner that reflects realistic ambitions and economic realities.  And, please, can the state focus for a change on preventing wildfires? That’ll have a much greater ROI for Californians than much of what Sacramento wastes our money on.