Fifty five years ago, on this day, July 21st, 1970, Carol Mather, Conservative MP for Esher has this to say –
The signs are very clear for all to see, and confirmation of these signs appears regularly in the newspapers. I will give only a few examples. It is said that jet aircraft landing and taking off in New York deposit 36 million tons of carbon dioxide into the air each year. This has a “greenhouse” effect because it allows the sun’s rays to come down but prevents them from escaping into the atmosphere. …
However, if this goes on, it is thought that by the end of the century the temperature of the earth could be raised by two degrees Centigrade, and this would begin to melt the ice caps. Water generated by this melting process could, they say, be sufficient in mass to flood many cities. But all is not lost. We are pumping so much grit into the air that the sun’s rays are not able to get through, and they are deflected back into the atmosphere. The ice-cap thus is catching up with us.
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 326ppm. 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 from the mid-1960s onwards, more and more articles and books were appearing that at least referenced the possibility of global warming from carbon dioxide build-up (at the same time, there were also fears of an induced ice age). Mather was one of the first parliamentarians to raise the issue.
The specific context was that by 1970 newspapers were running regular “pollution” columns, features editorials. Carbon dioxide was not mentioned in all of them, or even, in fact, a majority. But it was cropping up… The issue had even been flagged in the first Environment White Paper, released in late May 1970.
What I think we can learn from this is that we have known that there might be trouble ahead for a lot longer than most people think. Well informed people might guess “1988”, and that indeed was mostly my impression before I started the All Our Yesterdays project. Truth is, it was on the radar for almost 20 years before that.
What happened next – the issue got hammered a month later by the Chief Alkali Inspector. It was on the agenda through the 1970s, but it was only in 1988 that indifference, complacency and resistance was overcome, and that largely due to political opportunism. Ah, what a species!
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 21, 1991 – “Greenhouse Action for the 90s” conference leads to “The Melbourne Declaration”
July 21, 2001 – Sleeping protestors beaten by Italian Police