Thirty years ago, on this day, July 8th, 1996,
“Australian industry will argue this week that proposed greenhouse measures will slow growth in the global economy, with Australia among the countries that would be hardest hit by a fall in trade.”
“When green and gold don’t mix.” The Australian Financial Review, 8 July 1996,
Of course they will.
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 362ppm. As of 2026, 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
Australian business’s initial response to the greenhouse effect surge of awareness/concern in 1988 was to wait for it to blow over. When it hadn’t by 1989, they started pushing back, and by 1990 were pushing back hard both in public and especially in private.
They (especially the miners) had fought hard to defeat a carbon tax proposal in 1994-5, and were happy enough with the voluntary scheme (the “Greenhouse Challenge”) that replaced it. But still cautious and worried that their ability to make mega profits would be impaired.
The specific context was that John Howard had become Prime Minister after the March 1996 election, and took Keating’s indifferent hostility to green issues and dialed it up to eleven. The first major test was the second COP (we are now, of course, up to 31), at which Australia was under pressure to be less shit.
What I think we can learn from this – business is always going to squeal about the sky falling. That’s their favourite tactic – zap the wire that leads to people’s amygdala – because it always works.
What happened next
The COP process went on (and on, and on). The Greenhouse Challenge was a joke. Emissions went up. Howard successfully slowed the growth of renewables. The window of opportunity to do anything meaningful closed. We defenestrated ourselves, basically.
On this topic, you might like these other posts on All Our Yesterdays
July 18, 1996 – Geneva Ministerial Declaration noted but not adopted
References
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You can see the chronological list of All Our Yesterdays “on this day” posts here.
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.
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If you want to invite me on your podcast, that would boost my ego and probably improve the currently pitiful hit-rate on this site (the two are not-unrelated).
Also on this day:
July 8, 1962 – New York Times on ‘Glasshouse Effect”
July 8, 1970 – Environmental Protection Agency formed
July 8, 1991 – UK Prime Minister chides US on #climate change
July 8, 1996 – National Greenhouse Advisory Panel tells the truth…