Survey: Windfall Profits Tax on Oil Companies Backed by Most Americans to Fund Alternative Energy Research.

          

Four Out of Five Want Detroit to Shift All Future U.S. Vehicles to Hybrid
 Technology; 40mpg.org/Civil Society Institute Poll Shows Major Impact of
               Energy Cost Crisis on Thinking of Americans

Alarmed by high gasoline prices, the vast majority of Americans now would favor a special tax on the windfall profits of oil companies if the revenues were used to finance alternative energy research, according to a new Opinion Research Corporation national survey to be released on September 22, 2005 by 40mpg.org, which is a project of the nonprofit and nonpartisan Civil Society Institute (CSI).

  News event speakers will be:

   * Civil Society Institute President Pam Solo;

   * Opinion Research Corporation Vice President Wayne Russum.

According to the 40mpg.org/CSI survey, four out of five Americans now want Detroit to follow Toyota's lead in using fuel-saving hybrid technology in all future vehicles. The poll also will show that three out of four Americans feel more strongly today about the need for the federal government to impose higher fuel-efficiency standards for cars and other vehicles.

On March 17, 2005, an ORC survey commissioned by 40mpg.org/CSI found that two out of three Americans now agree that it is "patriotic" to buy a fuel efficient vehicle that uses less gasoline and, therefore, requires this country to import less oil from the Middle East.