Forty-eight years ago, on this day, June 6th, 1977 German climatologist Herman Flohn, who had been aware of Guy Callendar’s work during the war, asked “whither the atmosphere and Earth’s climate?,
Flohn at “Growth without Ecodisasters?” conference – Whither the Atmosphere and Earth’s Climates? by Prof. Hermann Flohn (Germany): Chman Dr Thomas F. Malone (USA)
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 333ppm. As of 2025 it is 430ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The broader context was that in the mid-1970s it became obvious to smart scientists that the carbon dioxide problem was going to be THE issue – see for example Wally Broecker in Science in 1975.
The specific context was that by the mid-1970s there was also a steady circuit of these sorts of hand-wringing international conferences, the humanities version of what the IIASA crowd of technocrats were doing…
What I think we can learn from this is that the 1970s really was – as per Richard Nixon and the UK Conservation Society – the “decade of decision.” And we – at a species level – decided by not deciding. Oops.
What happened next
Flohn kept up the good fight – as late as the 1990s he was trying to push back against the climate denialists (LINK)
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.
On this day June 4, 1984, 41 years ago, the new boss of the Met Office, John Houghton, wanted to get cracking on the climate issue,
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 345ppm. As of 2025, 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 the previous Met Office boss, John Mason, was pretty opposed to the idea that carbon dioxide was a problem (that is not to say he actively blocked the excellent scientists working on the issue at the Met Office). Houghton had very different views, thank goodness.
The specific context was by late 1983 various reports and meetings had taken place. It was clear carbon dioxide was going to be a serious topic of research and – sooner or later – policy attention.
What I think we can learn is this:
As human beings – we are smart enough to cause problems for ourselves, and smart enough to see the underlying causes. But actually fixing them? Harder…
As “active” citizens – see above.
Academics might want to ponder – their role in continuing the mystification, either by studying the wrong things, or “communicating” to the wrong people, or to the right people in terrible ways.
What happened next: Houghton kept going, as did his Met Office colleagues. Houghton had to retire as Met Office boss in 1990, and then became first head of Working Group 1 of the IPCC.
On this topic, you might like these other posts on All Our Yesterdays
Heaps of stuff about the Met Office etc
References
(as academic as possible, with DOIs if they exist.) hyperlinks.
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.
If you want to get involved, let me know.
If you want to invite me on your podcast, that would boost my ego and probably improve the currently pitiful hit-rate on this site (the two are not-unrelated).
Seventy one years ago, on this day, May 24th, 1954,
24 to 26 May 1954 – Eriksson, “Report on an informal conference in atmospheric chemistry held at the Meteorological Institute, University of Stockholm, May 24-26, 1954,” Tellus, 6 (1954)
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 313ppm. As of 2025 it is 430ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The context was that the question of carbon dioxide build-up had returned to prominence with the 1953 presentation by Gilbert Plass at the American Geophysical Union’s meeting. The Swedes had a lot of expertise in this field, and prestige (Carl Rossby etc).
What I think we can learn from this is that from the early 1950s good scientists were looking at this and going “hmm.”
What happened next. According to Weart (1997) they set up carbon dioxide monitoring stations and just got noise because there were too many forests nearby.
Rossby died too young. The baton was picked up by Bert Bolin and others. For all the good it did us, at a species-level.
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.
Twenty four years ago, on this day, March 15th, 2001,
First, Direct Observational Evidence Of A Change In The Earth’s Greenhouse Effect Between 1970 And 1997
Date: March 15, 2001
Source: Imperial College Of Science, Technology And Medicine
Summary:
Scientists from Imperial College, London, have produced the first direct observational evidence that the earth’s greenhouse effect increased between 1970 and 1997. Writing in the journal Nature (1), researchers in the Department of Physics show that there has been a significant change in the Earth’s greenhouse effect over the last 30 years https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2001/03/010315075858.htm
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 371ppm. As of 2025 it is 427ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The context was that the third IPCC report was about to be published, and everyone in the scientific world who studied this was pretty sure climate change was caused by carbon dioxide was A Thing, but it’s always nice to have the additional evidence.
What I think we can learn from this isthat you can compile evidence upon evidence and upon evidence, and it won’t be enough to convince some people. You can prove anything with facts.
What happened next
The third IPCC report came out. We’re toast. That’s almost 25 years ago.
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.
Fifty five years ago, on this day, March 4th, 1970, a snappily titled academic paper was submitted
Variations of the carbon dioxide content of the atmosphere in the northern hemisphere By BERT BOLIN and WALTER BISCHOF, Institute of Meteorology, University of Stockholm
(Manuscript received March 4, 1970; revised version May 28, 1970)
ABSTRACT
Six years of measurements (1963-1968) of carbon dioxide in the troposphere and the lower stratosphere are presented. The data reveal an average annual increase of the C0,-content of 0.7 +O.l ppm/year, while during this time the annual industrial output has increased from about 1.9 ppm to 2.3 ppm/year. Thus the increase in the atmosphere is about & of the total output. Considerations of the possible increase of vegetative assimilation due to the higher COX-content of the atmosphere reveals that this is at most of the output, probably considerably less. The net transfer to the oceans thus is at least equal to + of the industrial output. The transfer rate across the sea surface seems effective enough not to represent an appreciable resistance and the decisive factor for determining this transfer therefore is the ocean circulation or turn over rate. The figures quoted indicate that 20-25 %, of the world oceans must have been available during the time of rapid increase of the industrial output of CO, (the last 30-50 years) to explain the rather large amount that has been withdrawn from the atmosphere. Still a continued increase of the fossil fuel combustion as forecast by OECD implies that the C0,-content of the atmosphere at the end of the century will be between 370 pprn and 395 ppm as compared with 320 ppm, the average value for 1968.
The amplitude of the seasonal variation is found to be about 6.5 ppm at 2 km and 3.5,ppm in the uppermost part of the troposphere. The phase shift of the seasonal variation between these two levels is 25-30 days. On the basis of these data a vertical eddy diffusivity K = 2. lo6 cm2 sec-l is derived. The amplitude of the seasonal variation in the lower stratosphere, 11-12 km, is less than…
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 325ppm. As of 2025 it is 427ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The context was that Bolin had been switched on fifteen years previous to the issue of carbon dioxide build up. He’d studied, after all, under Rosby, who died prematurely. Bolin had really caught hold of Keeling’s data and understood even then, I think the implications, (see 1959 Science Notes).
Bolin kept beavering away on the science, but also on the politics. And this paper is fairly typical. The findings are not necessarily startling, but in retrospect, they are part of the ominous “pending debacle” of it all.
(Fwiw, Bolin was also helping Keeling in Europe at this time, I’d need to go and reread Keeling’s biography to get the details right)..
The other context is that by the time this was submitted, even the king of the Netherlands was talking about CO2 build up at the beginning of 1970, the European Conservation Year.
What I think we can learn from this is that we knew plenty, we just didn’t understand and we didn’t want to accept the implications.
What happened next Bolin kept at it. The 1970s saw him begin to team up with Mustafa Tolba, head of the United Nations Environment Program, which was possibly the one thing that emerged from the Stockholm conference in 1972.
Bolin would talk to journalists about CO2 build up (see 1978 BBC radio documentary).
Bolin was the obvious pick, unanimous, I think, to be chair of the IPCC, which he obviously held for quite some time. And if anyone can be said to have died a good a well-timed death, it’s Bolin. He died just after the 2007 Bali COP, which obviously he did not attend because he was too ill. The Bali COP saw the “roadmap to Copenhagen” laid out. So he died thinking that maybe just maybe, we wouldn’t be entirely too late to act on the warnings that he had been giving since 1959
Thank goodness he was not still alive to witness Copenhagen.
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.
The context – since the 1950s people had been keeping tabs on carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. The dogma that extra carbon dioxide being put into the atmosphere would be absorbed by the oceans had been exploded by Revelle and Seuss (not the same Seuss as yesterday’s post!)
What we learn – we knew plenty enough to be taking action
What happened next. Oh, you know the rest, if you’ve been reading this site for any length of time. The emissions kept climbing, the atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases kept climbing. The temperatures kept climbing. The social movements performed a bunch of three year spasms every decade or so…
What we learn is that scientists are definitely on tap, but they’re never on top, and that anyone who thinks they are is deluded.
What happened next
Advice kept getting given. We’ve bucket loads of the stuff.
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.
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 353ppm. As of 2025 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The context was
The starting gun for *public* concern about climate change had been fired a few months before (June 1988), thanks to both James Hansen’s testimony to a Senate committee in Washington DC, a very hot summer, and other events (including statements by senior politicians such as George HW Bush and Margaret Thatcher). Ramanthan’s work on the effect of all the other trace gases on estimated temperature rise had been one factor in making the Villach meeting of 1985 what it was.
What I think we can learn from this
That smart people have been scratching their heads/worrying about the earth’s radiation budget and imbalance for a long long time.
What happened next
Scientists kept sciencing, and the emissions kept climbing.
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.
References
V. Ramanathan R. D. Cess, E. F. Harrison, P. Minnis, B. R. Barkstrom, E. Ahmad and D. Hartmann 1989. Cloud-Radiative Forcing and Climate: Results from the Earth Radiation Budget Experiment Science Vol. 243, No. 4887 (Jan. 6, 1989), pp. 57-63
Fifty two years ago, on this day, December 29th, 1972,
In Baltimore in December 1972 I gave a talk on the issue of human weather control to the annual convention of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). AAAS meetings are internationally known because they bring together research scientists and policy makers to discuss the societal implications of new knowledge…. After speaking for half an hour or so, on how various kinds of human activities could change the climate, I concluded that, unfortunately, only a relatively few people were aware of the possibilities. I then quipped: “Nowadays, everybody is doing something with the weather, but nobody is talking about it.”
At the front of the audience, a distinguished-looking gentleman was taking notes: he turned out to be the doyen of all science writers, Walter Sullivan of the New York Times….
Sullivan, W. 1972. Goals for US Urged on Weather Control. New York Times, Dec 29, p.50.
(Schneider, 1989: 200)
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 327ppm. As of 2024 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The context was that Stephen Schneider is perhaps being a little naive here, because he’d already made headlines the previous year, thanks to a paper that he had co-written that had talked about the possibility of an ice age thanks to all the dust and smoke that was being put up. That paper turned out to be wrong and was used as a club by denialists to hit Schneider over the head with it for the rest of his life. Because that’s who they are. As for Sullivan, he had been aware of the CO2 possibility at the latest 1961 but much more likely, by 1957; he had after all written a book about the International Geophysical Year.
What we learn is that by the early 1970s carbon dioxide buildup as a problem was getting more attention. There had been an article earlier the same year in May I want to say 1972 in The New York Times. There was of course by now, the United Nations Environment Program setting up shop.
What happened next: The carbon dioxide build-up issue kept getting random reports all through the 1970s. Only in 1988 did it finally punch through.
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.
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 378ppm. As of 2024 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The context was that denial of climate change and spurious science to back it up was still a major thing. And this was before social media, before it was very easy for scientists to explain what they were doing, how they were doing it, why they were doing it, and so forth. Real Climate was a real boon to a lot of people who wanted to keep up with what was going on, and to refute the latest denialist talking points.
What we learn is that good scientists have been willing to spend precious time explaining the facts and the theories and the observations and where the facts, theories and observations might not necessarily mesh. And this has, perhaps over time, reduced the confusion. in some people’s minds, maybe. Of course, the simple fact is that a lot of people are choosing not to understand, because if they did understand, it would be pretty bad for their egos and their worldviews. Ignorance is bliss. Alethophobia is a thing.
What happened next Real Climate still going 20 years later. It’s a solid performance and a solid achievement.
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.
