Eighteen years ago, on this day, August 9th, 2008, at the third UK “Climate Camp” a mass action took place.
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The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 386ppm. 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 that from the early 1990s, non-violent direct action had been taking place on environmental issues (Twyford Down, Newbury etc). By the early 2000s Rising Tide was protesting – COP 6 in the Hague, etc etc. At the G7 protests in 2005 a bunch of people pointed out that summit-hopping was not the way forward, and that climate change was not getting the necessary treatment. This led to the first climate camp, in 2006.
The specific context was the climate movement, and the ‘alternative’ protest scene more generally, was riddled with undercover cops and so forth.
Meanwhile, there is a fairly limited number of repertoires available in these sorts of situations. The Kingsnorth mass protest drew heavily on 1999’s J18 stuff – different coloured masks etc etc.
What I think we can learn from this – we’re doomed.
What happened next this was the high water mark, pretty much for Climate Camp. People went and summit hopped Copenhagen after the nice cuddly Blackheath Climate Camp of 2009 despite the fact that Climate Camp had been predicated on not summit hopping. See also, my XR, we quit statement,
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On this topic, you might like these other posts on All Our Yesterdays
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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.
If you want to get involved, let me know.
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:
August 9, 1955 – Canadian physicist Gilbert Plass submits his paper
August 9, 1999 – The Australia Institute calls for emissions trading
August 9, 2000 – a new Greenhouse Strategy – including on LNG. Yeah, yeah sure
August 9, 2001 – OECD calls on Australia to introduce a carbon tax. Told to… go away…