Thirty five years ago, on this day, June 28, 1988, NGOs suggested deep deep cuts. Ha ha ha
Developed nations should commit themselves to a 50 per cent reduction in the use of fossil fuels by 2015 to slow and then stop the warming of the Earth, a group of non-governmental organizations said yesterday at a conference in Toronto on the atmosphere.
McInnes, C. 1988. Cut use of fossil fuels by half, group urges. The Globe and Mail, 29 June.
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 353ppm. As of 2023 it is 423ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The context was the Changing Atmosphere conference was a mix of NGOs and scientists and the engineers were pushing for a very ambitious target, as this press release based report shows, a 50% reduction by 2015
What I think we can learn from this
It was the NGOs who knew what was needed and and were “Demanding The Impossible” or “the necessary,” as you might also look at it
What happened next
The actual target presented at the end of the conference was a watered-down compromise of 20% reduction by 2005. And this was adopted with caveats by various nations but did not succeed in the United Nations process. which called merely for stabilisation by the year 2000 of rich nations (which none met) – his was of course a farce and a betrayal
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.