Fifty five years ago, on this day, September 24th, 1970,
“The British Society for Social Responsibility in Science has formed an Art and Technology group…. the first demonstration sponsored by the group coincided with the opening of the Arts Council’s international KINETICS exhibition 24 Sept. The work MOBILE was presented to critics and spectators and driven around London. It consists of a box covered with PVC, and mounted on top of a car. The box contained meat, flowers and vegetables. A tube fed the exhaust of the car into the box, with stunning visual (and chemical) results. The group hopes that the idea will be taken up by people around the world.”
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 325ppm. As of 2025, when this post was published, it is 430ppm. This matters because the more carbon dioxide in the air, the more heat gets trapped. The more heat, the more extreme weather events. You can make it more complicated than that if you want, but really, it’s not. Fwiw, I have a tattoo of the Keeling Curve on my left forearm.
The broader context was from about 1969 British scientists and activists were starting to link local and global air pollution (and pollution more broadly).
The specific context was that London’s air seemed much cleaner thanks to the Clean Air Act of 1956 – and was, in some ways. In other ways, not so much…
What I think we can learn from this is that cars have been a catastrophic invention, on ecological, social, psychological levels. God help us all.
What happened next
By 1973 the eco-wave was basically gone, and wouldn’t be back until the late 1980s. These waves, they come and go…
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.
See also – Kinetics. The record of an exhibition. Hayward Gallery 1970 : WestminsterResearch
Also on this day:
September 24, 1989 – Petra Kelly disses the Australian Prime Minister
September 24, 1991 – Australian denialist gives “Greenhouse Myths” seminar.
September 24, 1993 – A museum exhibition travels to Pittsburgh