December 30, 2007 – Bert Bolin dies. He was a Swedish scientist, did more than anyone else (I would argue) from the 1950s to the 1980s to get carbon dioxide build-up on the political agenda (he was most certainly not alone in doing this – proper group effort). Find posts about him on this site here.
Bolin’s death was exquisitely well-timed. He had been the first chair of the IPCC, and that organisation had been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize a couple of weeks earlier. The COP meeting of the UNFCCC in Bali had agreed – over US objections – a two year plan of negotiations for a big important/solve the post-Kyoto problem meeting to be held in Copenhagen in December 2009.
Bolin, I hope, died believing that, finally, at last, possibly too late, the rich nations were being successfully corralled into doing something serious on the issue he had been so responsible for.
Bolin’s book – A History of the Science and Politics of Climate Change: The Role of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change – is fairly dry, but great if you’re a geek like me
Btw, at that time atmospheric CO2 was 384ppm. It’s roughly 418 now