Oakland (Special to ZennieReport.com) – According to a new study by Pew Research, Americans desire for electric vehicles and renewable energy is declining:
There’s been a decline in the breadth of support for renewable energy in the form of wind and solar power. The shares who favor expanding solar and wind power farms are down 12 percentage points and 11 points, respectively, since 2020, driven by sharp drops in support among Republicans.
Interest in buying an electric vehicle (EV) is lower than a year ago. Today, 29% of Americans say they would consider an EV for their next purchase, down from 38% in 2023.
Still, a majority of Americans (63%) support the goal of the U.S. taking steps to become carbon neutral by 2050. When asked which is the greater priority, far more Americans continue to say the country should focus on developing renewable energy than fossil fuel sources (65% vs. 34%).
The survey, conducted May 13-19 among 8,638 U.S. adults, finds a fairly modest share of U.S. adults (25%) say it’s extremely or very important to them personally to limit their own “carbon footprint.” Far more give this middling or low priority.
What is the reason for this? The Pew Researchers immediately go to whether the respondents are left or right, Democrat or Republican. Well, here’s another reason: the economy and the higher cost of switching to electric vehicles and renewable energy.
83 Percent Of Low-Income Households Are Too Cost-Burdened To Adopt Renewable Energy
An ABC News report from May 1, 2024, in other words this year, contained this information from the Joint Center for Housing Studies at Harvard University:
About 40% of households earning $45,000 to $74,999 were rent-burdened, and almost 70% of households between $30,000 and $44,999 were burdened. In 2022, 83% of low-income households were cost-burdened, with 65% experiencing severe burdens.
Rent reached historic highs in 2021 and 2022, the Joint Center for Housing Studies of Harvard University report found. And currently, more Americans are burdened by rent than ever before. Harvard defines “cost-burdened households” as those that spend more than 30% of income on rent and utilities. Because of that renewable energy takes a back seat to basic needs.
Median rents were 21% higher in 2022 than they were in 2001, with adjustments for inflation. However, renters’ incomes have risen just 2% during the same period.
And though rental costs are cooling, they remain well above pre-pandemic costs.
Also Let’s Add In The Pandemic And The Fast Elimination Of Pandemic-Aide Programs
The Pandemic and American policy to curb the spread of COVID-19 are the first cause of why the economy is running so poorly today, this slowing renewable energy adoption. First, the main policy was to order the closure of bricks-and-mortar businesses. The vast majority of American business calls for operation out of a building if the organizations are at or over five people.
The American response to COVID should have been to compensate businesses for closing their doors, or allowing them to open if they had an air cleaner, a mask policy, and a social distancing plan, with special government assistance to business to pay for the installation of air cleaners and hand-sanitizers. Instead, there was no such effort to help business stay open or compensate them for closing, and as a result a large number of small businesses closed permanently.
Instead, we were given the Payroll Protection Loan Program, Or “PPP Loan” program. The problem with the PPP Loan Program was two-fold: first, it forced Americans to take on debt when it should have been a grant, or “PPP Grant” program. Second, it should have been designed to remain in place until the American economy reached a rate of growth over double what it was prior to the Pandemic as a way of making up for lost gains. Then, emergency price controls on key products like groceries, food, and gas should have been imposed to keep inflation at bay.
No Coordinated Sustained Program Of Economic Aide Caused Weak Economic Performance During The Pandemic
That approach would have given Americans the chance to better cope with the need to move from where they were to where they needed to be because of business closures. But the option of remaining open but only with aide both financial and technical would have reduced the number of Americans uprooted because of business closures due to Pandemic policy. And that hampers the move toward renewable energy.
The result of not providing a coordinated economic aide response is that the rate of annual growth in GDP is still less than what it would have been if there was no Pandemic. Draw a line from GDP growth up to 2019 and then add a projection from there, and the line is greater than the actual line that includes the dramatic dip in American GDP in the second quarter of 2020. By this author’s estimate, the U.S. Economy is still just over $2 trillion below what would have been its normal course of growth as of June 30th, 2024.
So we have not really recovered from The Pandemic, and inflation is still a problem that America insists on dealing with, without price controls. But as this is happening, electric cars are being pushed as an alternative at a great rate, yet they’re still more expensive than the gas-powered alternative by $10,000, or $44,000 vs. $55,000. So, while electric cars are less costly to maintain, that difference is more than offset by their high price. Believing that situation will change without effective, directed economic stimulus, is foolish. Renewable energy adoption must meet basic common sense.
Most Data On EV Adoption Rates Focus On Households, MultiFamily Rates Are Awful
The rate of adoption of “EV” , or electric vehicles and power taken as a bundle, is estimated at between five percent and seven percent by many sources. But the rate of adoption of “EV” for multifamily buildings is much slower, at around 1 percent. According to a 2019 survey conducted by the American Housing Survey and the U.S. Census Bureau, approximately 43.9 million residences, or 31.4% of housing in the U.S. today, are multifamily.
That means one of every three Americans lives in multifamily residences. And given that such a large chunk of Americans are in housing with traditional energy sources, it would seemingly take 100 years before complete turnover is realized.
Thus, the best way to excelerate the adoption of clean energy is to have a coordinated federal program that focuses on the weak-link first: multifamily. housing. And to make that happen means a vast national solar source installation program. And that would be with the idea of lowering the total energy cost of the multifamily dweller. But the end result is that the government has to establish a manhattan-style and level of program, and to that end, it has not done that.
A Renewable Energy Energy Conversion Program Is Needed
The path of policy is clear: the government has to establish a manhattan-style and level of program of clean energy conversion and with a target date of rate of adoption of 20 percent of mutifamily housing in four years. But it also needs a plan for jobs for those current workers who are in the fossil fuel sector to get other jobs and assistance before, and not after, plant closure. And we need a plan of development of technology to make the fossil fuel sector as close to zero emissions as possible.
But we must make sure to get money to families that need it and reduce the cost of living so that they’re more likely to be able to afford the clean energy infrastructure. The government is going to have to pay for the giant, multifaceted, conversion plan and then push the cost down the road a good distance. It’s not going to be cheap. And it has to be matched with a plan of infrastructure upgrades, along the way.
Stay tuned.