On this day, September 5, 2005, then Labor opposition spokesperson for the environment Anthony Albanese (where have I read that name recently?) introduced a private member’s bill
And oh, look, he’s all in favour of climate triggers…
On this day the level of atmospheric carbon dioxide was 376.89 ppm Now it is 421ish- but see here for the latest.
The context is that the Liberal National government of John Howard was enthusiastically boosting fossil exports, doing everything it could to slow renewables and to scupper international action. Labor were trying to make political capital out of this (and Albanese also – to be fair – seems like a decent human being who understands, on some level, what is at stake for our species).
Why this matters.
It doesn’t, does it? “We knew.” That can be our obituary. Smart enough to understand the dumb things we were doing, not smart enough to stop doing the dumb things.
What happened next?
We kept digging and burning, burning and digging. A small subset of that “we” got seriously rich doing it.