title: The Distribution of Climate Change Public Opinion in Canada.
abstract: While climate scientists have developed high resolution data sets on the distribution of climate risks, we still lack comparable data on the local distribution of public climate change opinions. This paper provides the first effort to estimate local climate and energy opinion variability outside the United States. Using a multi-level regression and post-stratification (MRP) approach, we estimate opinion in federal electoral districts and provinces. We demonstrate that a majority of the Canadian public consistently believes that climate change is happening. Belief in climate change's causes varies geographically, with more people attributing it to human activity in urban as opposed to rural areas. Most prominently, we find majority support for carbon cap and trade policy in every province and district. By contrast, support for carbon taxation is more heterogeneous. Compared to the distribution of US climate opinions, Canadians believe climate change is happening at higher levels. This new opinion data set will support climate policy analysis and climate policy decision making at national, provincial and local levels.
authors.affiliation: Department of Political Science, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, California, United States of America.
authors.forename: Matto
authors.identifier: http://orcid.org/0000-0001-5784-435X
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Mildenberger
authors.affiliation: Department of Environment and Society, Utah State University, Logan, Utah, United States of America.
authors.forename: Peter
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Howe
authors.affiliation: Department of Political Science, Université de Montréal, Montreal, Québec, Canada.
authors.forename: Erick
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Lachapelle
authors.affiliation: Department of Political Science, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, California, United States of America.
authors.forename: Leah
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Stokes
authors.affiliation: School of Forestry and Environmental Studies, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut, United States of America.
authors.forename: Jennifer
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Marlon
authors.affiliation: Department of Government, University of Essex, Essex, United Kingdom.
authors.forename: Timothy
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Gravelle
mesh_terms: D002170:Canada; D057231:Climate Change; D006801:Humans; D011639:Public Opinion; D011640:Public Policy; D012044:Regression Analysis; D012424:Rural Population; D014481:United States; D014505:Urban Population