The GOP's 15 major presidential candidates have widely diverging views on climate change, which range from Ted Cruz's open skepticism regarding the scientific consensus on the issue to Lindsey Graham's insistence it is time to seek solutions.

Many of the White House hopefuls have not even articulated a particularly precise stance on the matter given that a recent Pew Research survey revealed that only 15 percent of Republicans believe that addressing global warming is a top priority, CNBC reported.

Front-runner Donald Trump has come out as an unequivocal climate change denier, but the tycoon turned candidate insists that his view does not mean that he does not care about the environment.

"I believe in clean air. Immaculate air," Trump has noted. "But I don't believe in climate change."

While not all GOP candidates are that doubtful of science, many seem to be weary of the costs that could come with effectively addressing global warming, the business channel explained. Ohio Gov. John Kasich, for instance, told NBC's "Meet the Press" that proposed fixes should not hurt the American economy.

"Man absolutely affects the environment," Kasich said. "Of course we have to be sensitive to it, but we don't want to destroy people's jobs based on some theory that's not proven."

But in a Los Angeles Times editorial, the director of George Mason University's Center for Climate Change Communication, Edward Maibach, accused Republican candidates across the board of "hemorrhaging credibility" on the issue.

"Republicans ... want to satisfy their big donors - fossil fuel companies and executives, for example, which don't want regulations imposed on carbon pollution - without frustrating or alienating voters," Maibach chided.

But the only "winning position for the GOP candidates (is) embrace climate change and make a forceful case for the policies that they feel will be most effective in addressing the problem," he predicted. "Anything else is likely to make it harder for Republicans to take back the White House in 2016."