On this day, 47 years ago, Joseph Gibson, chief scientist at the National Coal Board, was keen to dampen concern and examination of coal’s global environmental impacts. With palpable glee he wrote a letter on April 10 1979 to the Chairman (Brian Flowers) and the board members.
“I promised to let Board members have a copy of the IEA report on the greenhouse effect…. The only firm fact so far is that the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is increasing. It is concluded that there is no evidence of a rise in global temperature due to this concentration increase at present.” He then goes on to quote from the work, by Irene Smith – “There is little evidence to support either a complacent or an alarmist attitude…”
(Gibson, J. 1979 Carbon Dioxide and the Greenhouse Effect. April 10 TNA COAL 30/414)
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 336ppm. As of 2026 it is 428ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The broader context was that the National Coal Board had been explicitly aware of carbon dioxide build up since (at the latest) 1972, and was looking for an excuse not to have to do much. And in Irene Smith’s work, they were able to cherry pick what they wanted.
The specific context was that Gibson was surely aware that in other parts of the British state apparatus an “Interdepartmental Group on Climatology” was about to present a report.
What I think we can learn from this is that people who are comfortable in their own way of thinking find it hard to take new threats seriously until they are staring them in the face.
What happened next: The National Coal Board hired some people to do some work on the carbon dioxide work. This was good stuff, but it all kind of didn’t contribute in the way that it could have, not because those people were less than stellar, but simply because the Thatcher governments had other fish to fry. And Thatcher had made it clear herself that she wasn’t going to “worry about the weather”.
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:
April 10, 2006 – “Business warms to change” (Westpac, Immelt) – All Our Yesterdays
April 10th, 2010 – activists hold “party at the pumps”
April 10, 2013 – US companies pretend they care, make “Climate Declaration”