Thirty seven years ago, on this day, May 4th, 1989,
GLOBAL WARMING HEARINGS BEFORE THE SUBCOMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND POWER OF THE COMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND COMMERCE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES (USA)
https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/007606238
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 353ppm. As of 2026 it is 4xxppm, but check here for daily measures.
The broader context was that Congress had been holding hearings about carbon dioxide build up since, well, the first ones I can find are the Tsongas one in 1977 (and a bigger one in 1980). And there had been plenty of others through the course of the 1980s. Famously, in December 1985 Carl Sagan had explained the greenhouse effect and the need to do something about it to Senators. Then in ‘87 push the aftermath of Villach gained momentum and adherence and various American NGOs with three or four letter acronyms,
And in 1988 their push succeeded, and the issue broke through.
The specific context was that George H. W. Bush had won the 1988 election, and on the campaign trail, he had promised to convene an international meeting. It was becoming obvious, however, that the Bush administration was not going to listen to scientists like James Hansen. It was instead going to listen to people who were telling it convenient truths.,
What I think we can learn from this. that politics is the long hammering of hard boards, as per Max Weber.
What happened next. Bush was exposed as silencing Hansen by Al Gore. And then the following year, Bush tried to not invite Bert Bolin, the head of the IPCC, to his much-delayed international conference.
And the emissions climbed, the concentrations climbed and doom approaches.
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:
May 4, 1985 – world leaders promise to solve “climatic change”
May 4, 1990 – coal industry sweats over greenie influence
May 4, 1992 – Liberals to be terrible on environment, for once.
May 4th, 2012 – The Heartland Institute tries the Unabomber smear. It, er, blows up in their face…
May 4, 2016 – South Australian Premier preening at Emissions Reduction Summit