On this day, November 18 in 1989, small island states made one of the first of their many many declarations of “stop burning the damn fossil fuels.” Usual impact, or rather, release the Male Declaration on Global Warming and Sea Level Rise.
[The amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere was 353ppm. At time of writing it was 421ishppm- but for what it is now,well, see here for the latest.]
The context was this –
By 1987, in diplomatic circles, it was clear a climate change debate was coming, and that there might conceivably be another of those toothless UN treaties that keeps bureaucrats busy and happy. The issue exploded in the second half of 1988. By 1989 everyone was making stern proclamations of this that and the other. This was one of them, albeit from people with more to lose, and in the shorter term, than others.
Why this matters.
We knew. We do not lack knowledge. We lack courage and power.
What happened next?
Maldives kept on keeping on about climate – who can forget the underwater cabinet meeting of 2009. Etc.
On this day in 1980 an international gathering of scientists took place in Villlach, Austria.
“The first major initiative to result from the establishment of the WCP was an international conference on climate change, held in Villach, Austria, from 17 to 22 November 1980. Under the chairmanship of Professor Bert Bolin of the University of Stockholm, the delegates issued a warning that the accumulation of greenhouse gases posed a great risk to the earth’s natural equilibria; they declared that the issue consequently had to be addressed with some urgency. Although their pronouncement drew some attention, its political impact was negligible.”
[The amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere was 338.7ppm. At time of writing it was 419ishppm- but for what it is now,well, see here for the latest.]
Why this matters
This is part of the long slow growth of awareness and concern
What happened next. One of the attendees was Australian scientist Graeme Pearman. Later that year, in September 1980, the Australian Academy of Science held a symposium about carbon dioxide build-up in Canberra.
In 1985 another Villach meeting set the international ball properly rolling, thanks to US Senators paying close attention…
And the emissions? Oh, they kept climbing. Of course they did. I mean, we didn’t stop burning the fossil fuels, did we?
On this day, November 10 in 1988, a conference in Hamburg called for an even stronger target than the Toronto Conference in June of that year. However, elsewhere, the IPCC was meeting for the first time, and its (far more cautious) recommendations would prove weightier
1988 a World Congress on Climate and Development was held in Hamburg [It was November 7 to 10]. This called for carbon dioxide emissions to be reduced by ’30 per cent by the year 2000 and 50 per cent by 2015. It argued for unilateral action from the industrialised nations to start the process of change; a global ban on the production and use of CFCs covered by the Montreal Protocol by 1995 and urgent strategies for reversing deforestation and beginning afforestation programmes.
Paterson, M (1996: 35)
See the conference proceedings here – https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-642-45670-1#about-this-book
[The amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere was 350 or soppm. At time of writing it was 416ppm- but for what it is now,well, see here for the latest.]
The context was this –
Why this matters.
In 1988 folks realised more or less what needed to be done. These were not the folks in charge of the show though. And within a couple of years the predatory delay gang had got their organisations and tactics worked out… We need to remember all this…
What happened next?
Hamburg was forgotten immediately. The international diplomacy rolled on, leading from the beginning of 1991 to the United Nations process that led in June 1992 to the UNFCCC – United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. During those crucial years, the US Administration of George HW Bush played chicken with everyone. Everyone blinked. Bush “won.”
On this day, October 22 in 1997, the Competitive Enterprise Institute (nasty neoliberal ‘think’tank) hosted a pre-Kyoto spine stiffening meeting.
“On October 22, 1997, the CEI hosted ABARE’s Brian Fisher at a luncheon with the aim of winning over “economic attaches to embassies of developing countries which might prefer differentiation to uniform reduction targets”. The CEI had “recognized the strategic importance of Australia in the climate change gambit” according to CEI research fellow (and Australian national) Hugh Morley. “If Australia sticks to its guns”, Morley said, “there might not be a Kyoto treaty after all.” (Hugh Morley, 1/11/97, “Australia Cool To Warming”, <www.cei.org/gencon/005,01305.cfm>.)”
From Jim Green “WMC Ltd: corporate greenhouse gangster”
[The amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere was 360.98ppm. At time of writing it was 421ishppm – but for what it is now, well, see here for the latest.]
The context was this –
American corporate interests were solidifying pre-existing links with Australian denialists (politicians, corporates, bureaucrats) – these had begun in earnest in 1990 (Tasman Institute hosting various folks) and then gradually strengthened. The “Countdown to Kyoto” conference had already been staged in Canberra, by this time…
Why this matters.
Think internationally. Those preventing climate action do.
What happened next?
Kyoto was a joke. Not a funny one. And here we are.
On this day, October 21 in 1989, the Commonwealth Heads of Government issued a warm-words statement.
“The Langkawi Declaration on the Environment was a declaration issued by the assembled Heads of Government of the Commonwealth of Nations on the issue of environmental sustainability. It was issued on October 21, 1989 at Langkawi, Malaysia, during the tenth Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting(CHOGM).
[The amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere was 350.33ppm. At time of writing it was 421ishppm- but for what it is now,well, see here for the latest.]
The context was this –
Everyone was making bold statements that Something Must Be Done. It made them feel good. It responded to recent surges in green votes. It amounted to nothing.
Why this matters.
Let’s be skeptical about the power of a pledge, okay?
On this day August 30 1990, the IPCC’s meeting in Sundsvall, Sweden featured attempts by the USA and Australia to water down policy findings.
The IPCC had been set up in 1988, in part to stop climate scientists being too independent and making a repeat of what happened over ozone less likely (The Reagan Administration had felt ‘bounced’). It had delivered its first report ahead of the Second World Climate Conference (which had been pushed back a few months so that it could also serve as the starting point for international negotiations for the impending climate treaty).
Some nations (but not – at this point – Australia) had said, with varying degrees of sincerity/seriousness, that they would try to cut their emissions by 20 per cent by 2005. This target had been agreed at a conference in June 1988, and so was known as the “Toronto Target” (Some NGOs at Toronto had been pitching even higher, btw).
The Australian Federal Labor Government was wrestling over this – The previous Environment Minister, Graham Richardson, had lost a Cabinet battle over it in May 1989. HIs successor, Roz Kelly, was still trying to get it through, in the face of opposition – e..g. A “Labor Party’s caucus primary industries and resources committee report, [chaired by] Brian Courtice (Qld). The report said the Government had been conned by green groups and would risk future electoral success if it continued to “appease” them.”
So, anyway, against that backdrop, this is entertaining –
“Mrs Kelly said reports last week that the Australian delegation to the International Panel on Climate Change in Sweden [IPCC 4th Session SUNDSVALL 27-30 August 1990] had supported moves by the United States to water down its policy findings were being investigated. The delegates had been told before leaving for the meeting to support the Toronto targets.”
My Conversation piece about the Sundsvall meeting here.
[The level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere was 353 ppm. Now it is 421ish- but see here for the latest.]
Why this matters.
There are no “pure” processes from which we fall. Everything is messy, contested. Organisations (states, corporations etc) defend their interests, try to shape narratives.
What happened next?
A weak weak treaty was agreed in 1992.
Since 1990, human emissions have gone up by about 67% per cent. The age of consequences is here for some (ironically mostly those least to blame) and is imminent for everyone.
On this day, August 24th, in 1994 the first signs of a split in the business opposition to climate action appeared.
[The level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere was 357.59 ppm. Now it is 421ish- but see here for the latest.]
“An additional factor was the splintering of industrial interests. The Global Climate Coalition and the Climate Council had been the main industry participants in the INC, representing mainly coal and oil interests. However, a development within INC 10 was the emergence of an industry lobby in favour of the convention’s further C02 reductions (ECO, 24 August 1994: 4; 26 August, 1994: 1). There was now a wide coalition of industrial interests favouring action on climate change. One consisted of parts of the insurance industry, scared of losses from freak weather (and whose interests have been forwarded, interestingly, by Greenpeace). Another was the ‘sunrise industries’ of renewables and energy efficiency. Yet another was the gas industry.
Matthew Paterson 1996 page 194
Why this matters.
Splits in the previously united church/state/business sector are part of ‘how things change’ if you believe all that dialectic stuff. It’s immaterial now though, given how the atmospheric concentrations have climbed, will climb…
What happened next?
A few re-insurers turned up for a day at the COP1 meeting in Berlin the following year, but were of course outnumbered, outgunned and outfought by the fossil lobbyists. (See Jeremy Leggett’s “The Carbon War” for an account of this).
Then, in 1997, BP became the first sizeable defector from the Global Climate Coalition. Now actual outright denial is relatively rare. But resistance to appropriate action continues…
On this day, July 8, 1991 the United Kingdom Prime Minister John Major gave his first, brief speech about environment/global warming, at a Sunday Times.Environmental Conference.
He came about as close as any UK Prime Minister/Satrap of the 51st State can to saying “Hey, America, get your act together.”
All he could really bring himself to say was “The United States accounts for 23 percent, the world looks to them for decisive leadership on this issue as on others.”
“Personally, I have always thought it wrong to call it the greenhouse effect, I dislike the term, I dislike it because the image is too cosy, too domestic and far too complacent. Begonias and petunias it most certainly is not, the threat of global warming is real, the spread of deserts, changed weather patterns with potentially more storms and hurricanes, perhaps more flooding of low lying areas and possibly even the disappearance of some island states.”
The context was that the UK was about to host the G7 meeting, and the USA was digging its heels in during the negotiations for a climate treaty, slowing things down so that only the most minimal deal could be reached.
A recent trip to the US by UK Environment Minister Michael Heseltine had failed to break logjams, and Heseltine had publicly slapped down a senior US official who was trash-talking him.
Why this matters.
We always need to remember that the architecture of international law – the UNFCCC – was shaped by United States hostility to global action.
What happened next?
Major, at Rio the following year, offered to host the follow-up event, to show the UK “mattered”. And the winner was… Manchester. Ooops.
On this day, June 1979, the declaration at the end of the G7 Meeting in Tokyo contained this gem.
3. We pledge our countries to increase as far as possible coal use, production, and trade, without damage to the environment. We will endeavor to substitute coal for oil in the industrial and electrical sectors, encourage the improvement of coal transport, maintain positive attitudes toward investment for coal projects, pledge not to interrupt coal trade under long-term contracts unless required to do so by a national emergency, and maintain, by measures which do not obstruct coal imports, those levels of domestic coal production which are desirable for reasons of energy, regional and social policy. “We need to expand alternative sources of energy, especially those which will help to prevent further pollution, particularly increases of carbon dioxide and sulphur oxides in the atmosphere.” http://www.g7.utoronto.ca/summit/1979tokyo/communique.html
The G7 had started in the mid-70s, initially as a one-off meeting hosted by the French. Everyone was in a panic about the economy (stagflation), the uppityness (and yes, I mean that – freighted with all the horrors of white supremacism) of people of colour in the Majority World, and also the unruliness of the locals (strikes etc).
Why this matters.
Promises been going on a long time, haven’t they?
What happened next?
Climate was not there on the agenda in Venice 1980, and once Reagan came in, that was it – it would be another ten years before the G7 pretended to be green.
On this day, June 16, in 1972 the UN Conference on the Human Environment in Stockholm, concluded. Four years in the making it had acted as a magnet for lots of various concerns. It also acted as a punctuation point – the end of the first big wave of public concern about environmental matters (the next wave wouldn’t really get going until the mid-late 80s).
What did Stockholm give us? Well, the United Nations Environment Program, albeit at a much lower size and heft than some wanted. UNEP proved crucial as an institutional ally for the World Meteorological Organisation and various groups of scientists trying to get carbon dioxide build up properly on and then up the agenda.
But on the same day, and more interesting,, was the release of the song “Five Years” by David Bowie (it had been recorded in November 1971).
Pushing thru the market square So many mothers sighing News had just come over, We had five years left to cry in
News guy wept and told us Earth was really dying Cried so much his face was wet Then I knew he was not lying
Why this matters.
Stockholm, Bowie – yeah. Well, here we are. Fears of imminent (ecological) catastrophe have been with us before (that does not automatically mean that the latest rash of fears is unwarranted).
What happened next?
Stockholm became the major example of “how you do international environment conferences” I think, and the template has been replayed and replayed.
