Thirty seven years ago, on this day, October 13th, 1988,
October 13 1988 ITV programme “The Environment and Pollution” Lord Caithness says “we have got a world leading programme for finding alternatives to fossil fuels.”
And
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 351ppm. As of 2025, when this post was published, it is 425ppm. 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 that climate change had been “on the news” as a very small part of the broader ecological concern in the period 1968-1972. The Dutch had known about the issue, or at least Prince Consort Bernhard had. In 1988 the issue had burst back onto the scene.
The specific context was that ITV presumably made this show in response to Thatcher’s speech to the Royal Society in late September (but I am guessing).
What I think we can learn from this – everyone was told what was at stake. But turning even “listening” into action requires sustained civil society activity (of which social movements are only a subset), and that is tricky, especially in times of enforced neoliberal shitfuckery.
What happened next – more enforced neoliberal shitfuckery. Spasms of social movements and a basically dead civil society. And the emissions kept climbing.
(NB this is not to say Keynesianism is a barrel of laughs.)
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.
Also on this day:
October 13, 1990/97 – Ros Kelly defends the Interim Planning Target vs Australia does nothing
October 13, 1993 – IIASA and the IAMs – Gaia help us all – All Our Yesterdays
October 13, 2005 – “Climate Change: Turning up the Heat” published