Thirty seven years ago, on this day, November 28th, 1988, a doubt-casting paper from Federal Department of Primary Industries and Energy paper discussed at first “National Energy Consultative Council”
Clear answers on the climatic impact on Australia of the greenhouse effect will not be achieved for at least 10 years because of limited scientific knowledge, according to a Federal Department of Primary Industries and Energy paper.
The paper cautions against attributing some existing climatic conditions, like the drought in the United States and floods in Bangladesh, to the greenhouse effect.
Gill, P. 1988. Paper cautious on greenhouse effect. Australian Financial Review, November 30
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 352ppm. 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 that the warnings about carbon dioxide build-up had been coming since the early 1980s (ONA report, Tucker’s monograph). But in 1984, Australia had become the world’s largest coal exporter, so, there’s that.
The specific context was by mid-1988 the question of “the greenhouse effect” was one that could no longer be simply ignored. Denial and doubt-casting became part of the mix.
What I think we can learn from this – from the beginning, the Australian state was keen to defend exporters from scrutiny, challenges.
What happened next – nothing substantive has changed in the intervening 4 decades. Except the atmospheric concentration of CO2.
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:
November 28, 1976 – climate modelling workshop in USA
November 28, 2001 – “Stellar team for sun-powered debate” in Adelaide –