Author: drmarchudson

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Australia

April 29, 1967 – Canberra Times reviews Science and Survival

Fifty seven years ago, on this day, April 29th, 1997, there was a book review in the Canberra Times which gave those who wanted to know enough to worry about. The book in question was Barry Commoner’s “Science and Survival”.

“Our factories, our cars, pour smoke and carbon dioxide into the atmosphere — and the consequences? Smog, of course; city-dwellers have come to take that for granted, though the time is coming when we must ask ourselves how much smog we are prepared to tolerate. But, worse than this, the “glasshouse effect” of atmospheric carbon dioxide must be increasing the temperature of the earth; and a report by the US President’s Science Advisory Committee has seriously considered the possibility of the Antarctic ice cap melting within the next few centuries, and raising sea level by some 400 feet — and engulfing many of the world’s major cities in the process.”

Aitchson, G. 1967 -A menace ot mankind?” Canberra Times, April 29, p.10

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 322ppm. As of 2024 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that Barry Commoner’s Science and Survival had come out the previous September and had been favourably reviewed by the Guardian and The Telegraph. And now, the Canberra Times.

What we learn is that this book was a crucial node in increased awareness of the climate issue. Not just because it was reviewed well, but because it inspired documentary makers such as Richard Broad and Roy Battersby. 

What happened next, The Canberra Times kept reporting on pollution issues. A Senate Select Committee inquiry started the next year. Were they inspired by reading Science and Survival? who knows…

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 29, 1970 – Washington DC symposium talks about carbon dioxide

April 29, 1998 – Australia signs the Kyoto Protocol

Categories
United States of America

April 29, 1939 – Whitestone bridge across East River opens (infrastructure foreclosing)

Eighty five years ago, on this day, April 29th, 1939,

Robert Caro’s book The Power Broker documents how Moses not only destroyed the existing trolley system but also assured that the expansion of roads left as little room as possible for mass transit. Ignoring the arguments of planners, he built the Whitestone Bridge across the East River in the late 1930s with a light load-bearing structure, thus foreclosing the possibility of tits carrying subway lines like two of the older city bridges.

(Oppenheimer & Boyle, 1990: 117) 

 Also, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bronx%E2%80%93Whitestone_Bridge

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 311ppm. As of 2024 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that Robert Moses was a prick, a racist thug, who was transforming New York and not necessarily transforming in a nice way. There are accusations that he made bridges too low. There is also this one that he deliberately made a bridge too weak to allow subways across it. The broader context is that American cities were being, like all cities around the world are being transformed. In America, it was by motorcars. This was a process that has continued, of course. 

What we learn is that infrastructure has politics which is invisible if you’re rich, white, male, and able-bodied. But it’s very visible to the people on the pointy end, or largely visible to them. The politics of infrastructure is something that climate activists need to understand better. In my humble opinion. 

What happened next, Moses was finally toppled 30 years later, having caused immense damage, but not as much damage as he would have if community groups hadn’t resisted. And it wasn’t all down to Jane Jacobs, though she did a good job of publicising the resistance. 

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 29, 1970 – Washington DC symposium talks about carbon dioxide

April 29, 1998 – Australia signs the Kyoto Protocol

Categories
Australia UNFCCC

April 28, 1997 – John Howard says Australia should not have signed climate treaty (UNFCCC)

Twenty seven years ago, on this day, April 28th, 1997, Prime Minister John Howard says Australia should not have signed the UNFCCC. Classy guy.

On 28 April 1997 on ABC Radio National, the Australian Prime Minister, John Howard, stated publicly that he believed that Australia should never have signed the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. This was the culmination of over a year of backpedaling by the Australian Liberal-National Party Government on the issue of climate change due to purported negative economic impacts.”

Yu and Taplin, 2000 The Australian Position at the Kyoto Conference in Gillespie and Burns (eds) Climate Change in the South Pacific: Impacts and Responses in Australia, New Zealand, and Small Island States, Kluwer

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 364ppm. As of 2024 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that there was the COP3 (Kyoto) conference coming at the end of year, and the Berlin Mandate of 1995 meant that rich nations (including Australia) were supposed to turn up and agree to a CUT in emissions.

What I think we can learn from this

Howard has never been a “conservative”. He’s a radical statist directing taxpayers’ money and assets towards his mates. Like Thatcher squandering North Sea Oil, he squandered the commodity supercycle. Prick.

What happened next

Howard had ten years to destroy everything decent about Australia. Job’s largely done, though there are mopping up operations ongoing. And resistance, of course.

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 28, 1975- Newsweek’s “The Cooling World” story.

April 28, 1993 – Australia to monitor carbon tax experience

Categories
Uncategorized

April 27, 2010 – Rudd says no CPRS until 2012 at earliest. Seals fate

Fourteen years ago, on this day, April 27th, 2010, soon-to-be-ex Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd sorta seals his fate.

Rudd’s problem, however, was not just the decision but the manner of its release. The story was broken by Lenore Taylor in the Sydney Morning Herald on 27 April when she reported that the ETS had been shelved ‘for at least three years’. The leak to Taylor was devastating. Rudd was taken by surprise and left without an explanation. ‘It was a very damaging leak and hard to retrieve, ‘ Wong said. ‘It derailed our government’, Martin Ferguson said.

(Kelly, 2014:292)

And

It was the decision that seemed to snap voters’ faith in Kevin Rudd. Perhaps a final straw. Straight after the government announced it was deferring an emissions trading scheme until 2013, graphs of the Prime Minister’s satisfaction rating looked like a rock falling off a cliff. Labor’s primary vote tumbled after it. The kitchen cabinet was scheduled to meet on April 27 to decide exactly how to explain the delay, and the conditions under which the government would pledge that the ETS policy would be revived.

News of the decision had also filtered through to a few members of the broader cabinet, who had determined to try to wind it back when cabinet met to “ratify” the budget on April 29. But on the morning of April 27, the Herald disclosed the decision to remove the scheme from the budget in a front page article entitled “ETS off the agenda until late next term”. It was the first many ministers and senior public servants had heard of it.

Knowing the back story helps explain why the government’s response on that day was so confused.

Taylor, L. 2010. Decision that shattered faith in PM. Sydney Morning Herald, 5 June, p.2

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 390ppm. As of 2024 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that Rudd had used climate as a stick to beat John Howard with, then enjoyed Turnbull twisting in the wind as the Nationals and many Liberals were not as keen on climate action as Turnbull was.

What I think we can learn from this

Spineless people don’t grow spines (see also Starmer, Keir).

What happened next

Chaos and horror. Not the fault of Gillard or the Greens. It’s all on Rudd and Abbott and their enablers.

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 27, 1979 – Ecology Party first TV broadcast ahead 

April 27, 1987 – “Our Common Future” released.

April 27, 2007 – Coal-bashing campaign by gas company ends

Categories
Australia Renewable energy

April 27, 1999 – 2% increase in use of renewables report received

Twenty-five years ago, on this day, April 27th, 1999, another government-appointed group delivered another ‘worthy’ report.

The high-level Greenhouse Energy Group will today receive the final report of the task force set up by the Federal Government to devise ways to meet its target of a 2 per cent increase in the use of renewable energy over the next decade.

Hordern, N. 1999. Greenhouse targets study ready. Australian Financial Review, 27 April, p. 11.

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 368.5ppm. As of 2024 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that as part of his pre Kyoto spoiler efforts, John Howard had promised a 2% renewable energy target. That was in 1997. The whole process had been extremely painfully drawn out by it since then, meaning that it was in effect, a 1% target. And this was another small link in a long chain of events. So let’s have another report. Let’s have another Working Group. Let’s just draaaag the process out for as long as possible to demoralise and confuse everyone, so that we don’t have to do what we promised we would do. Politics business as usual. 

What we learn is they’ll make a promise but then getting them to implement it requires more energy, tenacity, and smarts than social movements and civil society tend to have. 

What happened next, A pipsqueak Mandatory Renewable Energy Target was finally introduced in April of 2002. And despite everything Howard had done, was already too successful, working too well, so by May of 2004, he was asking his business buddies for help in undermining it. 

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 27, 1979 – Ecology Party first TV broadcast ahead 

April 27, 1987 – “Our Common Future” released.

April 27, 2007 – Coal-bashing campaign by gas company ends

Categories
Australia Carbon Pricing

April 26, 1992 – Ros Kelly abjures a carbon tax

Thirty two years ago, on this day, April 26th, 1992 the entirely sensible idea of a carbon tax was killed off (for now), with the Australian Federal Environment Minister running up the white flag again.

A spokesman for Environment Minister Ros Kelly said the Government was not considering a “carbon tax”, which would hit fossil fuels such as petrol and coal. Instead – at least as a first step – it favoured “no-regret” options. These were measures to increase energy efficiency, which will have overall economic benefits even if dire greenhouse scenarios don’t eventuate. The spokesman said: “This Government would be delinquent if it did not take a precautionary rather than a cavalier approach to the greenhouse effect. The worst-case scenarios are terrifying.”

BCA spokesman Mark Emerson said Australia should not support the EC proposal for a commitment by developed countries to stabilise greenhouse gas emissions by the year 2000. “Business is concerned that, against the background of the enormous scientific uncertainties, inappropriate policy responses might be applied which would have devastating economic and social effects without any discernible environmental benefits,” he said. “None of Australia’s regional trading partners or competitors – except New Zealand – will agree to the EC option.”

Skinner, S. 1992. Greenhouse: Aust yet to set its policy. Sun Herald, 26 April, p. 13.

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 356.5ppm. As of 2024 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that the idea of a carbon tax had been raised within the Ecologically Sustainable Development groups. Entirely sensible idea. And it had sent business or elements of business into a total meltdown. And now, under the new Keating government, it was off the table. But of course, Kelly would be going to the Rio Earth Summit in a couple of months. And the headbangers didn’t want her trying to sneak things in via the back door. 

What we learn is that simple straightforward ideas that would have helped were defeated by powerful greedy actors who had only their own short-term power and comfort in mind. And politicians went along for the ride. 

What happened next, Rio happened. There was another attempt to get a carbon tax through in 94/95, after Ross Kelly was forced to resign over sports routes. And it failed. And we as a species failed 

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 26, 1998 – New York Times front page expose on anti-climate action by industry

April 26, 1998 – “Industrial Group Plans to Battle Climate Treaty”

Categories
Australia

April 25, 1989 – The Greenhouse Effect – is the world dying? (Why yes, yes it is)

Thirty five years ago, on this day, April 25th, 1989, it was all put in stark terms at the University of Wollongong. (Spoiler, the answer is “no, not ‘dying’, being murdered – there’s a difference.),

25 April 1989 University of Wollongong Campus News – The Greenhouse Effect – is the world dying?

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 353ppm. As of 2024 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that everyone was losing their mind about “the greenhouse effect.” Or alternatively, you can say, understanding the implications and the likelihood that no one would do anything meaningful. This was happening around the world. 

What we learn is, we knew what was at stake we really did. Alternatively, you could say the world is not dying, it’s being killed and the people who are killing it have names and addresses, as per Utah Phillips. 

What happened next, everyone pledged their devotion to the cause of climate change or the greenhouse effect. For about five minutes. Then most of us went back to sleep, failing to understand what was at stake or understanding it but feeling powerless, lonely, et cetera. Because it is just unimaginably big as an issue. 

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 25, 1969 – Keeling says pressured not to talk bluntly about “what is to be done?”

April 25th, 1974 – Swedish prime minister briefed on carbon dioxide build-up

April 25, 1996 – Greenpeace slams Australian government on #climate obstructionism

Categories
Business Responses United Kingdom

April 24, 2004 – Launch of the Climate Group

Twenty-years ago, on this day, April 24th, 2004, the business outfit the “Climate Group” was launched, with a speech by Tony Blair.

24 April 2004 Launch of the Climate Group. Blair speaks at it.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/3662303.stm

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 377.7ppm. As of 2024 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that the UNFCCC process was potentially coming back on board with Kyoto moving towards ratification. Businesses were worrying. The Global Climate Coalition was dead. There was a space for new business activity. And along comes the Climate Group launched today but probably conceived a couple of years before. 

What we learn is that the early 2000s mark a kind of shift, there is that split in business between what the headbangers have wanted and succeeded in destroying, i.e. destroying high ambition. And then there’s all the other companies, which might make money from the green transition, or can just read a bloody Keeling curve, and see that there’s trouble ahead. 

What happened next, the Climate Group had its peak years probably in the run up to Copenhagen. It’s still going. I’m not quite sure why. There is now a coalition called “we mean business” as well. But there’s always a proliferation of these groups, I guess, representing slightly different interests and making work for well-meaning but fundamentally dim technocrats.

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 24, 1980 – the climate models are sound…

April 24, 1994 – a carbon tax for Australia?

Categories
Australia

April 23, 2013 – Power Companies want Abbott to rethink Direct Action

Eleven years ago, on this day, April 23rd, 2013, power companies tried to influence the “mind” of Tony Abbott, who was a dead-cert to become Prime Minister at the forthcoming Federal Election.

Power companies have urged the Coalition to rethink its ‘direct action’ carbon plan, saying that it may cause them more difficulty than the Government’s emissions trading scheme.

The Australian Financial Review reports that the Energy Supply Association of Australia (ESAA) has urged the Coalition to change its plan to immediately scrap the carbon tax if it wins the federal election on September 14.

ESSA represents big power companies such as Origin, TRUenergy and International Power. It has supported an emissions trading scheme for a long time and the recent….

https://www.manmonthly.com.au/power-companies-urge-coalition-to-change-carbon-plan/

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 396.7ppm. As of 2024 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that Abbott was clearly going to become prime minister, Labor’s opinion poll ratings were in the toilet. His idiotic “direct action” policy was going to become law of the land. And the power companies would be adversely affected because it was opaque and stupid. And so you know, “be careful what you wish for you might get it.” They had either resisted Gillard’s carbon tax or played dead. And now there were going to be consequences for those actions. 

What we learn is that businesses are fantastically short-sighted despite their claim to do long term planning or being responsible, farsighted, on behalf of investors, etc. And here we are. 

What happened next? Abbott became prime minister. He abolished Gillard’s Emissions Trading Scheme, instituted his moronic direct action. Emissions didn’t go down the way they needed to. And here we are. 

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 23, 1954 – Irish Times runs carbon dioxide/climate story. Yes, 1954.

April 23, 1998 – Michael Mann’s Hockey Stick paper published.

April 23, 1970 – book review nails coming #climate problems…

April 23, 2009 – denialists caught denying their own scientists…

Categories
United Kingdom

April 22, 1965 – Manchester Evening News article on C02 and global warming

Fifty nine years ago, on this day, April 22nd, 1965, the Manchester Evening News ran another article warning about carbon dioxide build up,

22 April 1965 Article about C02 and global warming in Manchester Evening News

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 320ppm. As of 2024 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that a couple of months earlier, Lyndon Johnson, as President of the United States, had made a special address to Congress, which mentioned CO2 buildup, and other scientists were sniffing around the issue. The Evening News has talked about carbon dioxide buildup before but this was a pretty clear case. 

What we learn is that if you were a tolerably intelligent person with a tolerably decent memory, and I don’t know, O-level chemistry and physics, you’d have understood the climate issue from them a lot earlier than I thought even a couple of years ago. 

What happened next Manchester Evening News very periodically covered the issue. So did everyone. But it wasn’t really until ‘69 – 70 that it got any traction, and then it went away again until 1988. 

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 22, 1975 – UK Civil Service scratches its head on #climate

April 22, 1993 – Clinton’s announcement used by anti-carbon pricing Aussies