On May 5 1953, yes, 1953, The West Australian newspaper had a short piece with Gilbert Plass, warning the American Geophysical Union about the build-up of. carbon dioxide…
Plass was a geochemist who had read Guy Callendar and understood what he was talking about.
Why this matters
Let’s not pretend that 1988 was the first time anyone heard about climate change. That said, this sort of “we were warned” thing can be a little bit unfair. Because there are all sorts of potential threats, potential problems in the world. And if we responded to all of them, instantly with alarm, we’d never get anything done.
But certainly, I think by the late 60s, early 70s, we did know enough to be concerned. And we didn’t act in accordance with that concern. And here we are.
What happened next?
Plass kept on for a little while, and even attended the 1963 Conservation Foundation meeting in New York. But he didn’t do further climate work. There’s a good account of him in Alice Bell’s “Our Greatest Experiment,” btw.
2 replies on “May 5, 1953 – Western Australian newspaper carries “climate and carbon dioxide” article”
Excellent catch. You are quite right that by the late 60’s we knew enough to be concerned – I remember as a sixth form (age 17) schoolboy in 1968 doing physics A level learning about carbon dioxide acting like a blanket, and how increasing levels of it in the atmosphere from burning coal and oil were increasing global temperatures.
It is a surprise to see this published in a newspaper 15 years earlier in 1953 – I was only 2 at the time, so not only for my whole adult life have we known and done nothing effective, but it has been a cause for concern since I was born.
and just to add that long before Guy Callendar, who you reference, there was Sevente Arrhenius (https://green-history.uk/people/pioneers/who-was-arrhenius) who proposed the theory in **1896** !!!