Forty nine years ago, on this day, July 10th, 1976,
The Seveso disaster was an industrial accident that occurred around 12:37 on 10 July 1976, in a small chemical manufacturing plant approximately 20 kilometres (12 mi) north of Milan in the Lombardy region of Italy. It resulted in the highest known exposure to 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin (TCDD) in residential populations,[1] which gave rise to numerous scientific studies and standardized industrial safety regulations, including the European Union‘s Seveso III Directive. This accident was ranked eighth in a list of the worst man-made environmental disasters by Time magazine in 2010.[2]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seveso_disaster
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 332ppm. As of 2025, 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 post-war Europe reindustrialised at pace. The state wasn’t always so hot at spotting and doing anything about forms of pollution, which were largely seen as a regrettable but inevitable prie to be paid for capital-P Prosperity (which basically meant capital accumulation, obviously).
The specific context was that – oh, the usual…
“After the incident, ICMESA initially refused to admit that the dioxin release had occurred. At least a week passed before a public statement was issued that dioxin had been emitted, and another week passed before an evacuation began. Even then, the government was saddled with the responsibility of determining the boundaries of the evacuation area, and thereafter to organise the evacuation. This constituted a major imposition on the community as well as on government resources.”
What I think we can learn from this is that anyone who has fantasies about a competent regulatory state really needs to wake up and smell the coffee.
What happened next
The usual – court cases, no-one doing any serious chokey.
Follow-up health studies etc etc (check out the wikipedia article!)
Btw, Seveso ets a mention (oblique) in Ali Smith’s wonderful novel “Winter.”
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:
July 10, 1985 – French state commits terrorist act
July 10, 1996 – National Greenhouse Advisory Panel cops a serve
July 10, 2008 – first Australian #Climate Camp begins, near Newcastle