Fifty seven years ago, on this day, June 24th, 1969 a Californian newspaper syndicates an article entitled “Air Pollution Hangs Like an Ominous Veil”
“Moreover, his dumping of carbon dioxide into the air (six billion tons a year) threatens to change the climate and may indeed already have changed it.”
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 324ppm. As of 2026, 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 for this was that from late 1965, with the release of the President’s Science Advisory Committee report on Restoring the Natural Environment, the question of carbon dioxide had been appearing alongside other, more immediate and prominent pollutants.
What I think we can learn is this: by 1969, you could rely on carbon dioxide to appear in any lengthy article about global pollution.
What happened next:
On this topic, you might like these other posts on All Our Yesterdays
January 27, 1967 – Time Magazine talks carbon dioxide build-up
References
You can see the chronological list of All Our Yesterdays “on this day” posts here.
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.
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Also on this day:
June 24, 1974 – Conference on “Science and Technology for Human Development” opens in Bucharest
June 24, 1985 – Climate change rears its head at a development meeting…
June 24, 1986 – New Yorkers get to watch a documentary on “The Climate Crisis”
June 24, 2004 – UN Global Compact Summit in New York, launches ESG in “Who Cares Wins” report