Category: On This Day

Forty five years ago a Senator for the National Party (back when it was still serious, and not a collection of fruitcakes and nutjobs) laid out the basic facts and dilemmas.

February 25, 1981 – National Party senator nails the climate problem

Twenty three years ago, after one defeated emissions trading scheme in August 2000, and as second push was well underway, Australia’s Treasury Department tried to talk sense to Prime Minister John Howard. Ha ha ha.

February 25, 2003 – Australian Treasury says “carbon pricing. It’s not rocket science”

In the midst of the beserk carbon war of 2011, a radio shock jock grapples with sanity.  And wins.

February 25, 2011 – Alan Jones versus sanity

Are there other climate-related events that happened on this day that you think deserve a shout out? If so, let me know.

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In the early 1970s, with fears the oil would run out (or come under the control of untrustworthy A-rabs, which amounted to the same thing), there was intense interest in “alternative” energy sources. Australia was one of the leaders on solar research

February 23, 1974 – CSIRO Solar energy conference

By the mid-1970s the carbon dioxide build-up problem was beginning to cut through, especially in the aftermath of the very hot summer of 1976….

February 23, 1977 – UK Chief Scientific Advisor worries about carbon dioxide build-up. 

Although the “greenies” had been defeated by about 1992, angry old white men, deprived of relevance, were still fulminating. Take a bow, former Hawke-era minister Peter Walsh…

 February 23, 1993 – Peter Walsh spouting his tosh again

The best ever letter. No notes. 

Feb 24, 2024 The best letter to have ever appeared in the Financial Times

Are there other climate-related events that happened on this day that you think deserve a shout out? If so, let me know.

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Fifty four years ago today, a BBC documentary tackled the entirely-predictable (and well-funded) backlash against eco-concerns….

February 21, 1972 – Horizon and the backlash against “selling doomsday”

Forty eight years ago today, a workshop organised by the technocrats at the International Institute for Advances Systems “Analysis” took place. The technocrats will save us all (spoiler: no they won’t)

Feb 21, 1978 – “Carbon dioxide, climate and society” workshop

Twenty two years ago convenient and soothing lies about “clean coal” got a run at a conference in Australia.

February 21, 2004 – “Turning coal clean and green.” Sure. Any day now.

Are there other climate-related events that happened on this day that you think deserve a shout out? If so, let me know.

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Fifty five years ago John Maddox is fulminating against the concern over carbon dioxide build-up. Yeah, Maddox, that one is gonna age like a glass of milk (30+ yrs later, he admitted he was wrong. Sort of).

February 19, 1971 – Nature editorial on “The Great Greenhouse Scare”

Exactly 10 years later? An article on, erm, acting now not later. Forty five years after this, we’re still not acting. Just pretending.

February 19, 1981 – Nature article “Greenhouse Effect: Act Now, Not Later”

On the same day (and perhaps some in the room had seen the editorial?) people in the Ecology Party, since renamed the Green Party – were talking about the climate threat. Forty five damned years.

February 19, 1981 – Ecology Party meeting in Wells warns of carbon dioxide build-up

The IPCC, ever the technocrat-dominated body, announced it would study the fantasy that is CCS. They released the report in September 2005.

 February 19, 2003 – “CCS to be studied by IPCC”

As the public gets worried about climate change, the lobbyists, with many tools at their disposal, spring into action…

 February 19, 2007 – Australian gas lobby hard at work…

Normally I don’t do an “on this day” post if I am putting up something new. But there were too many fearful symmetries here to be ignored.

Lord Ritchie-Calder’s essay “Mortgaging the Old Homestead” had been published in various outlets (Australia, US). Sports Illustrated readers expressed their thanks (and alarm) on this day 56 years ago.

February 16, 1970 – Sports Illustrated readers appreciate eco-warning

The UK Department of Energy was busy telling everyone they weren’t being complacent on this day 54 years ago. Reader, they were complacent.

February 16, 1972 – Dept of Env boss “we can’t be complacent”

With climate change at the top of Australians’ worry list (recently and briefly), the denialists in the Liberal Party decide to psychologise basic physics. Bravo!

February 16, 2007 – Liberals say climate is a “mass panic”

Failed Presidential aspirant John Kerry is diverting attention from the Obama administration’s uselessness (well, worse) by pointing the finger at other assholes.

February 16, 2014 – US climate envoy John Kerry denounces “shoddy scientists and extreme ideologues”

Are there other climate-related events that happened on this day that you think deserve a shout out? If so, let me know.

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Sixty three years ago, questions around appropriate and possible technologies were on the agenda. Ritchie Calder, about to really get his head around the carbon dioxide problem, was present.

February 4, 1963 – A UN conference on technology for “less developed areas” starts

Forty six years ago, alongside American efforts, the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis was holding another climate meeting (something they’d been doing since about 1976).

February 4, 1980 – IIASA taskforce on Climate and Society

Thirty three years ago, coal exporters and their allies/minions were making sure all this stupid “greenhouse” nonsense wouldn’t get between them and their profits…

February 4, 1993 – Australian business versus the future (spoiler: business wins)

Twenty eight years ago today, a bent state department, ABARE, got a mild rebuke for its dodgy economic modelling that was being used as an excuse not to take climate action. 

February 4, 1998 – Ombudsman on ABARE and its dodgy af #climate modelling – All Our Yesterdays

Twelve years ago the Carbon Capture and Storage Association and the Trades Union Council release a report on how wonderful CCS will be for the UK economy.

February 4, 2014 – CCSA and TUC release Economic Benefits of CCS report

Are there other climate-related events that happened on this day that you think deserve a shout out? If so, let me know.

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So, trapped in a loop, knowing it and unable to change things? Nah, Groundhog Day the movie does not speak to climate activism at all…

 February 2nd is Groundhog Day!

Meanwhile, that wonderful decent human being Laurence Summers is writing the memo about dumping pollution on worthless people.

Feb 2, 1992- that “sarcastic” memo about exporting pollution…

Thirty years ago today the pitiful Fred Singer was spraying his denialist nonsense and personal attacks.

February 2, 1996 – denialist sprays #climate science with his bullshit

16 years ago the Australian psychodrama around the simple act of putting a price on carbon dioxide was in full flow (see tomorrow’s post). 

February 2, 2010 – Abbott on Direct Action, CPRS for 3rd failure… – All Our Yesterdays

Are there other climate-related events that happened on this day that you think deserve a shout out? If so, let me know.

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A busy day in climate history

Forty eight years ago, American audiences on PBS were treated to discussion about possible causes of climate change

February 1, 1978 – US TV show MacNeill Lehrer hosts discussion about climate change

Thirty six years ago the piss-weak daily business paper “The Fin” reprints a piece from the Financial Times about the crazy radical idea of, erm, putting a price on carbon dioxide.

February 1, 1990 – Australian Financial Review ponders carbon tax… (via FT)

Twenty one years ago scientists gather in Exeter to discuss “Avoiding Dangerous Climate Change.”  Er, we didn’t, it’s here and it’s going to get so much worse. Oh well.

February 1, 2005 – “Avoiding Dangerous Climate Change” conference begins – All Our Yesterdays

Rich people aren’t always stupid. On this day 19 years ago, an investor explains the consequences of a stupid American president.

Feb 1, 2007- Jeremy Grantham slams Bush on #climate

Interview with documentary film maker, Russell Porter

Feb 1 2023 – Interview with Russell Porter, Australian documentary maker

Are there other climate-related events that happened on this day that you think deserve a shout out? If so, let me know.

As ever, invite me on your podcast, etc etc.

January 30, 1961, in a story that would later be used by incoherent denialists, Walter Sullivan, New York Times science reporter, reported that the world was… cooling,

January 30, 1961 – New York Times reports world is cooling

On the morning of Monday 30 January 1989, the ABC 7.45am news reported the Prime Minister, Mr Bob Hawke, had begun an overseas trip to Korea, Thailand, India and Pakistan, with the primary aim of promoting Australian exports, particularly coal, iron ore and agricultural products.

January 30, 1989 – “Hawkie” flies off to flog coal

On this day, January 30, in 1989, James Baker, Secretary of State for the new George HW Bush administration gives a speech propounding so-called “no regrets” actions on climate change

January 30, 1989 – Je ne fais rein pour regretter… #climate jargon

Are there other climate-related events that happened on this day that you think deserve a shout out? If so, let me know.

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On this day, the United Kingdom government, led by John Major, released its “Sustainable Development Strategy”, which was going to return the UK carbon emissions levels to 1990 levels by the year 2000. And this was achieved, yep, great… except it was all part of the dash for gas and de-industrialization (off-shoring production).

January 25, 1994: UK government releases “Sustainable Development Strategy

AUSTRALIA’S electricity reforms and greenhouse policy appear to be headed in contradictory directions. While senior Federal ministers concede that a carbon tax would not be a single solution to meeting greenhouse targets, demand management reforms that would have a substantial impact on greenhouse emissions have been proposed by a working party of the National Grid Management Council. Yet the latest drafts of that report suggest that the NGMC will step back from critical recommendations.

January 25, 1995 – Australian electricity reforms mean more greenhouse gases…

January 25, 2013, one of the white men who has been born with a “safe pair of hands” had the good grace to admit that he’d misunderestimated the speed and breadth of climate impacts. Nick Stern, former World Bank economist, had been tapped on the shoulder by then-Treasurer Gordon Brown in 2005, and had produced a report (“the Stern Review” on the Economics of Climate Change). Interviewed by two Guardian journos at Davos 6 years after its release, he said 

 “Looking back, I underestimated the risks. The planet and the atmosphere seem to be absorbing less carbon than we expected, and emissions are rising pretty strongly. Some of the effects are coming through more quickly than we thought then.”  

January 25, 2013 – Lord Stern admits #climate “worse than I thought”

Are there other climate-related events that happened on this day that you think deserve a shout out? If so, let me know.

As ever, invite me on your podcast, etc etc.