Abstract

With international climate negotiations stalling due to the absence of a United States CO2 emission reduction policy, the challenge remains for climate change mitigation advocates; make sufficient policy and programs politically viable. Within the US and UK, it is unclear whether the public will support further climate change mitigation policies like carbon tax. An important part of this support will no doubt be influenced by general climate and energy discourse. However, are climate and energy communications, news and PR campaigns leaving individuals confused and disempowered especially when trying to reach out to peers? Despite best intentions by environmental non-government organisations and other communicators, embedded values and distortions in climate change communications maybe having a detrimental effect toward making necessary policies politically viable. What are the implications of this distorted climate discourse? A recent Yale survey (Leiserowitz et al, 2011) showed that whilst those on the right of the US political spectrum do show care for the environment they are not willing to pay for mitigation.