Month: October 2023

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United Kingdom

November 1, 1959 – M1 motorway section opened

Sixty four years ago, on this day, November 1, 1959

,“The first section of the M1 motorway, the first inter-urban motorway in the United Kingdom, is opened between the present junctions 5 and 18, along with the M10 motorway and M45 motorway.”

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 316ppm. As of 2023 it is 419ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that there had been an enormous boom in car ownership after the second world war. These were becoming necessities for many people, as out of town developments sprung up. They were also a sign that you had “made it” and a symbol of freedom, modernity, etc. And of course, with all of the branch chain lines getting a “Beeching” that pushed people into cars. But driving down country roads is risky and slow. Therefore, “I know, let’s have motorways modelled on the US Highway System.”

“

“What I think we can learn from this

When you do “bottom up” decision-making and you cater to the individual rather than aggregate demand, you get perverse infrastructure like motorways, which is hostages to fortune. And then you just keep building and keep building. You get induced demand, the easier you make it for people to drive, the more they will drive. But at the same time, if you don’t have bypasses around congested town centres, it also goes tits up… See also The Standard Oil, Firestone rubber GM conspiracy 

What happened next

You get the Buchanan Report, you get growing concerns about air quality and what is being done to town centres. And all of this feeds into concern about the loss of wildlife and the planet getting paved. And you see the British environmental movement slowly grinding to life. And of course in the early-mid 1990s the environment movement fighting the motorway movement to a standstill at least for a while. And the emissions climb, and people buy ever bigger cars…

What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.

Categories
Australia

November 1, 1989 – Senior Australian politician talks on “Industry and Environment”

Thirty four years ago, on this day, November 1, 1989, the deputy Prime Minister of Australia gives a speech with the usual words of “balance” at an Industry and Environment conference.

Australian companies must actively negotiate with the environmental lobby to achieve a balance between economic growth and conservation of the environment, according to speakers at a conference on industry and the environment in Sydney yesterday.

Although this one principle dominated the conference, the three main speakers at the conference – the Federal Minister for Primary Industries and Energy, Mr Kerin; the managing director of the paper manufacturer Amcor Ltd and chairman of the Business Council of Australia’s environmental taskforce, Mr Stan Wallis; and the president of the Australian Conservation Foundation, Mr Peter Garrett – found little other common ground.

Abbott, M. 1989. Business and Greenies ‘Must seek a balance’. Australian Financial Review, 2 November. 

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 353ppm. As of 2023 it is 419ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that Australia was now officially drunk on climate greenhouse, the environment “protecting our fragile world.” It had had the shit scared out of it, frankly, by ozone and the idea of lots of white people dropping dead in the streets because of skin cancer. But business’s response was still, at this point, muted. And they perhaps were just assuming that the whole thing would blow over the way it had 20 years previously. Don’t forget the people making the decisions in 1989 were the ones who had been youngsters in 1969 and then it seemed what had happened to the issue was quick forgetting. Meanwhile, the Labour government of Bob Hawke had been wrestling with ecological problems since day one, Franklin dam, the wet Tropics logging unit, you name it. And the activist Environment Minister Graham Richardson had in May 1989 tried to get the Federal Government to sign up to the Toronto target. He’d been slapped down by Paul Keating, then Treasurer. And meanwhile, the Liberal Party was looking to greenhouse and environment as a way of winning votes ahead of the next federal election, which had to happen by March of 1990. At this point, the Green Party did not exist, federally. So Kerin’s speech, where he extolled the virtues of “balance” is just your good old fashioned. pluralist “government will hold the ring” can.

What I think we can learn from this

Business keeps its powder dry and doesn’t spend money unnecessarily. 

What happened next

Labor clung on to power in 1990 by the skin of its teeth, thanks in part to the green vote. This meant that there was an Ecologically Sustainable Development policy making process, which was then chopped off at the knees by the next prime minister Paul Keating, and federal bureaucrats. It was an interesting three years in Australian environmental policy making and the aftereffects are with us still. Internationally we’ve got the pissweak UNFCCC, thanks to the intransigence of the Bush administration and its allies. In Australia, the Liberal suspicion of (and resentment of) green issues continues.

What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.

Categories
United Kingdom

November 1, 1974 – UK civil servants writing to each other on “Climatology”

Forty nine years ago, on this day, November 1, 1974, a senior Civil Servant wrote to the chief scientific advisor about climate research

“In 1974, the Met Office had marked an expanding interest in climate by starting a working party on world climatology, ‘with specific emphasis on climatic change’, under J.S. Sawyer, the Met Office’s director of research” CAB 164/1379. ‘Climatology’, Smith to Warren, 1 November 1974. Sawyer had written tentatively on anthropogenic global warming in 1972: J.S. Sawyer, ‘Man-made carbon dioxide and the “greenhouse” effect’, Nature 239 (1972), 23-26.

Agar 2015

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 330ppm. As of 2023 it is 419ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that “climatic” change – whether caused by man or natural fluctuations – was on the agenda of those who had to worry about the future as part of their day jobs. National Security Adviser and noted war criminal Henry Kissinger had made a speech to the UN General Assembly (April 15, 1974), the CIA weighed in with some food shortage. The Limits to Growth people were still around. And, of course, the oil shock was doing very interesting things to people’s economies and livelihoods. So the idea of setting up a working group to look at climatic conditions was not surprising.

[It would be interesting to know what the terms of reference particularly but I then would need to do that I wouldn’t need to go and look at the archives myself.] 

What I think we can learn from this is that the wheels of bureaucracy grind – it takes time to get anything to happen. And always, always watch for the terms of reference.

What happened next

Eventually, by various means, and against Met Office resistance, an interdepartmental committee on climate started meeting in 1978. It produced a report, which Margaret Thatcher then ignored…

What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.

Categories
United Kingdom

October 31, 2018 – Extinction Rebellion makes its declaration of rebellion

Five years ago, on this day, October 31, 2018, XR gathered in Parliament Square…

Declaration of Rebellion parliament square XR https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W6hVZVJwM50

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 408.7ppm. As of 2023 it is 419ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that the UK climate movement had basically been evaporated. After Copenhagen, the implosion of the Climate Camp, the revelation of the undercovers, the NGOs, having a budget crisis and not being able to do any real campaigning on legislation, because you never know if you’re going to be that far from an election (i.e. the Conservative government had made some very effective laws minimising the ability of NGOs to speak the truth or to campaign and this is one of David Cameron’s forgotten legacies). 

There were, of course, very successful environmental campaigns – fracking was stopped. But over all, on the climate issue per se, nobody was reclaiming any power.

So into that vacuum came Extinction Rebellion, which had been promulgated earlier that year. I remember having seen stickers with the angular hourglass on lampposts in Manchester from the summer onwards.

The timing was brilliant, because it had been a very hot summer, and the IPCC 1.5 degrees report had finally come out.

What I think we can learn from this

Organisations which benefit from exploiting a vacuum often get high on their own supply. They feel that they don’t need to pay attention to the rest of the actors in the ecosystem, because those actors have, by definition, failed. So the tone is very exuberant, it’s very emotion-based. It relies on ever greater amounts of publicity, hope and hype. And it is, in every sense, unsustainable. And so it came to pass with XR, which has splintered into tiny local actions and endless begging emails, while the energy is in its off-shoot, “Just Stop Oil”.

What happened next

Extinction Rebellion occupied some bridges with the agreement of the Met and in 2019, held wildly, quite, “successful” – depending on your metrics “rebellion.” By the end of 2019, it was clear that the moment was passing. The pandemic has helped to paper that over, but now what we’re left with is well, the hardcore of Just Stop Oil, while the rest of the climate movement has not revivified.

And here we are.

See also, my Conversation piece about “what next for XR”

What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.

Categories
Australia Economics of mitigation Green Jobs

October 30, 2008 – a worker-greenie coalition? Maybe…

Fifteen years ago, on this day, October 30, 2008, the top Union body (ACTU) and Australian Conservation Foundation co-launched a report about a putative “Green Gold Rush” of jobs, an argument they’d also been making in the early 1990s.

It was good old-fashioned ecological modernisation and green Keynesianism

AND 

On the same day, the Treasury released modelling that had been commissioned to support the wretched “Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme” of Prime Minister Kevin Rudd. 

“Australia’s Low Pollution Future: The Economics of Climate Change Mitigation”:

Treasury modelling establishes that there are benefits to Australia acting early if other countries also adopt carbon pricing but that delaying action may lead to higher long-term costs (source).

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 385.8ppm. As of 2023 it is 419ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was

In Australia everyone was talking about the climate, ahead of the long awaited launch of the CPRS White Paper in December.

Eco-modernist green jobs rhetoric was attempting to square the political circle, and at least reds and greens were talking to each other again (it had been rocky).

There was of course a history of this – see “Green Jobs Unit.”

What I think we can learn from this

We do like our stories of harmony and win-win. They soothe us. 

What happened next

The White Paper was shonky af (see Ross Garnaut’s op-ed ‘Oiling the Squeaks’). Rudd’s legislation attempts the following year were farcical giveaways. And then it fell apart… 

What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.

Categories
United States of America

October 30, 1983 – Carl Sagan hosts ‘nuking ourselves would be bad’ conference.

On this day, forty years ago, American scientists and science communicator Carl Sagan hosted a conference on the consequences of nuclear war…

Sagan and his colleagues orchestrated the “Conference on Long-Term Worldwide Biological Consequences of Nuclear War,” held in Washington DC to garner as much public and political attention as possible. The steering committee scheduled the two-day event to begin on Halloween. On October 30, 1983, Sagan published an expose on nuclear winter in Parade Magazine, a popular Sunday newspaper supplement with more than twenty million readers. Chaired by George Woodwell and kicked off by Stanford University’s eloquent president, Donald Kennedy, the conference itself was less a scientific meeting than an extended, staged press release. A satellite link – relatively new technology in 1983 – connected an audience of several hundred scientists, journalists, and politicians to members of the Soviet Academy of Sciences in Moscow.

(Howe, 2014:139)

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 343ppm. As of 2023 it is 419ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

Context

With the coming of the second Cold War (with the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, sharpening with the arrival of Reagan and his lunatic friends), scientists started thinking about what would happen if a nuclear war happened. Even a “small one”, some thought, would burn forests, releasing huge clouds of dust that would blot out the sun, creating a “nuclear winter.”

What we can learn

Climate change from carbon dioxide has been tied up with other global atmospheric threats (real and perceived – oxygen depletion, ozone depletion, acid rain, nuclear war). There is no “clear” narrative that ignores those…

 
What happened next

There were claims and counter-claims about this, and some scientists disagreed with Sagan (notably Steve Schneider). By 1986, with the coming of Gorbachev (in 1985) and the Chernobyl disaster, it seemed less likely that a war would happen. Meanwhile, along came the Ozone hole, and then the climate stuff kicked in, post-Villach…

Categories
Australia

October 29, 2004 – Aussie environmentalists win a court case…

Nineteen years ago, on this day, October 29, 2004, activists in Victoria won a legal battle about a filthy coal-fired power station.

Justice Stuart Morris delivered his judgement to a packed courtroom on 29 October 2004, ruling squarely in favour of the environmentalists. On one level, the decision is a straightforward administrative law judgment about a Minister overreaching her statutory powers. Yet in reaching the conclusion on this procedural point, Justice Morris had occasion to consider for the first time under Australian law the relevance of indirect greenhouse gas emissions of a major development.

(Berger, 2007: 166)

Quinn saved his most vicious attack for the environment movement. In an internal note to Hazelwood employees issued on the day of the decision [29 October 2004]

Extreme environmental groups who are hell bent on closing our industry obviously have a right to a say in our democracy, but these delaying tactics by such lobbying groups should never be allowed to frustrate legitimate critically important state energy projects… We have spent over $400 million on environmental and operational efficiencies since 1996, and it is about time that commitment was recognised by these groups. Their views are anti-coal, anti-business and anti-jobs, and if they succeed, they will cost thousands of local jobs with their narrow and simplistic arguments.

(Berger, 2007: 167)

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 377.7ppm. As of 2023 it is 419ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that pro-life pro-sanity campaigners had been doing legal stuff around trying to get Hazelwood shut down. For yonks. There was a court case and they won. In the short term, at least. 

What I think we can learn from this

The legal venues are one way forward, but by no means the only one. And any legal victory is only worth what happens next. (This is something that I first encountered as an idea while paying attention to the McLibel Trial and having this pointed out to me by Dave Morris.)

“They make the laws to chain as well.” 

“I fought the law and the law won. “

“This isn’t a Court of Justice son. This is a court of law. “

Ah the songs.

What happened next

Greenpeace started to do direct action around Hazelwood in 2005.

What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.

Categories
Media

October 28, 1906 – the birth of the Press Release

One hundred and seventeen years ago, on this day, October 28, 1906, the press release was “born”“According to public relations lore, the press release was born following a train wreck on October 28, 1906, in Atlantic City, N.J., that left more than 50 people dead.”

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 299ppm. As of 2023 it is 419ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that there kept being these sorts of disasters and events. Containing and corralling the media, which was a bit more independent and rambunctious perhaps, than it is now, was time-consuming and not always successful. So a press release is an inspired idea. Because it is a labour-saving device, which means that you don’t have to say the same thing over and over again. But also, you get to frame the narrative with some good –  what are now called – “sound-bites.”

What I think we can learn from this is the practice of corporate control and government control, via press releases at least, goes back a long way. For more about this, see Alex Carey – “Taking the Risk out of Democracy.”

What happened next

Perhaps someone has charted the growth of press releases, but basically the thing to come back to understand is most of what you read in the world in day-to-day journalism is from press releases that have been put out, the journalist has either changed it (or not changed it), and at most got some react quotes from someone, and then cobbled a story together. But this is the equivalent in information terms of endlessly eating fries or Big Macs. It’s not nourishing. So what you need is long form journalism from specialists, but who has the time for that? It costs money. So the daily press enters a death spiral, when an informed citizenry is essential…

What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.

Categories
Sweden

October 27, 1967 – “the Swedish environmental turn” picks up speed

Fifty six years ago, on this day, October 27, 1967, Swedish civil society started to properly switch on to the broad environmental threats…

In the middle of October 1967 the first edition of Hans Palmstierna’s book was released by Rabén & Sjögren, a medium-sized publishing house owned by the Swedish Co-operative Union. It was a short paperback of 129 pages and priced rather steeply at SEK 22.50. Since Rabén & Sjögren was not one of the leading companies on the Swedish book market, the publication did not receive any immediate attention from the media. It was not until 27 October that the book was first noted by the tabloid Expressen who dubbed it ‘one of the most pessimistic books to date’.22 On the very same day Hans Palmstierna also appeared in a seven-minute feature on the televised evening news. 

The book contains some mention of climate change 

“the book mentions it in passing (page 85). It is said to be called the “greenhouse effect” and it is estimated that once all the oil reserves are burned up that the average temperature of the planet will increase by 2-4 degrees (which will result in hardships in arid places, such as East Africa).”

 (via email from Heidenblad)

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 322.3ppm. As of 2023 it is 419ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that Swedish people had been beneficiaries of a nice post-war boom but booms always come with a price. This one, an ecological price that would, according to Palmstierna, start to be paid soon enough.

What I think we can learn from this

There’s always trouble in paradise. You can build the walls, which is what paradise means – a walled garden – but there will always be trouble.

What happened next

Palmstierna’s book caused a sensation. It was serialised, there were TV shows. At the end of 1967 the Swedes proposed to the United Nations that they talk about talking about having a big conference in the future, in the middle of ‘68. The Swedes were successful in getting that on to the provisional agenda. In December ‘68 he UN General Assembly said “yes”, and the Stockholm conference happened in 1972

What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.

Categories
Carbon Capture and Storage Uncategorized

October 26, 2001 – BioEnergy Carbon Capture and Storage mooted

Twenty two years ago, on this day, October 26, 2001, BECCS put in an early appearance, in a letter to the American publication Science.

“We provided this information in an IIASA interim report, which never received much attention, but laid a foundation for the forthcoming Science letter. However, in retrospect, these early scenarios were the cradle of the types of scenarios we now see underpinning the Paris Climate Agreement. With these scenarios at hand, we had more confidence and submitted our letter to Science, which was published on October 26th, 2001.” https://climatestrategies.org/twenty-years-of-beccs-a-short-retrospection/

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 371ppm. As of 2023 it is 419ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was

The IPCC was putting together a special report on CCS. There was a workshop within it including the stuff about bio energy, carbon capture and storage, which is where you would basically plant trees, burn them and capture, or dump the trees in the deep ocean. In essence.

What I think we can learn from this

BECCS had a long history longer than I thought, and crucially, IIASA is a midwife again. And so these technologies have long histories. It takes a long time to get anything off the ground. And if you do want to get it off the ground or in this case under the ground you could do worse than IIASA.

What happened next

By 2013-14 BECCS was becoming part of the narrative. It has stayed there. There are all sorts of fantasies we will tell ourselves and each other, soothing stories of salvation

What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.