Thirty years ago, on this day, March 26th, 1995, red and green try to mix, with limited success.
Bad blood flows between the green movement and the union movement. The controversy over logging recently has led to ugly incidents between timber workers and conservationists. Ms George said she had agreed to speak at a conference on women and the environment this weekend to try to ease some of the hostility between the two groups…. The Australian Conservation Foundation’s executive director, Ms Tricia Caswell, said the ACF, Greenpeace and women’s groups had decided to host the conference at the World Congress Centre because women were often the backbone of community environment groups and were the main environmental educators to children but received little recognition.
Milburn, C. 1995. ACTU’s George Plays Peacemaker To Greens, Unions. The Age, March 24
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 361ppm. As of 2025 it is 427ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The context was that Australia is a patriarchal settler colony with horrendous attitudes on sex, race, nature, and there are ongoing cultural, ideological, political, physical battles around this. When ACF set this conference up, they were probably hoping that they could bask in the glory of a carbon tax, but it was not to be.
crucially,Can we find someone who was there that would be interesting, a woman who was there in Melbourne, 30 years ago. So for an interview, Article doesn’t have to be specifically about that conference and whether it meant anything, because, frankly, maybe it didn’t. It can be more broad than that. Okay, send out the request.
What I think we can learn from this
We fail. And we keep failing.
What happened next
We failed some more.
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.
Thirty five years ago, on this day, March 24th, 1990, on the night of the Federal election, a retiring Labor Minister got stuck in to environmentalists.
“The backlash against environmentalists began very publicly on election night. Peter Walsh launched a bitter attack on them from the tally room, attempting to deny any influence they might have had on the outcome. He was joined in later weeks and months by a number of Cabinet ministers, largely but not exclusively from the economic portfolios, but careful evaluation of that election result makes Walsh’s assertion untenable.
Malcolm Mackerras (The Australian, March 1, 1993) summarises the result well: on the primaries, the Coalition had 43.5 per cent to Labor’s 39.4 per cent, the Democrats 11.3 and others 5.8 per cent.
However, Labor’s environment second-preference strategy was so successful that the two-way party preferred vote became 50.1 per cent for the Coalition and 49.9 per cent for Labor (which just fell over the line to win in seats).”
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 354ppm. As of 2025 it is 427ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The context was the Australian Federal election, where the ALP gets a fourth term very narrowly, and crucially, thanks to small g green voters, though Peter Walsh, who was stepping down, didn’t like to be beholden to people he despised (people who believed in, you know, beauty and post-material values and all the rest of it.) Walsh was an old-fashioned Labor right, disdained these people, and must have hated that his party could only get back into power with their help. Thus, of course, vociferous denial and denunciation.
What I think we can learn from this is that people like Walsh, and there are lots of them around, cannot abide fragility, especially their own.
What happened next
Walsh acted out his fury and hate and presumably self-loathing in both his newspaper columns. See here LINK and here, LINK for example, and also as part of the Lavoisier Group. If ever you needed an Australian poster poster boy for anti-reflexivity, (link to video about this here) it’s Peter Walsh
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.
By Greg Allen https://www.npr.org/2015/03/10/392142452/florida-gov-scott-denies-banning-phrase-climate-change
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 401ppm. As of 2025 it is 427ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The context was that even if the Florida governor didn’t ban mention of carbon dioxide, climate change, it’s entirely plausible that he could have. And these sorts of cultural battles in the United States with Republicans wanting to wish things they don’t like away, well known. It’s really the hide and seek tactic of a child who doesn’t understand that they’re not the center of the universe. “If I close my eyes and can’t see you, that means that you can’t see me.” The world doesn’t work like that, and most people figure that out when they’re quite young. Others, not so much.
What I think we can learn from this. In the following 10 years Florida has had various hurricanes which don’t stick around in public memory the way that I think things used to (maybe I could be wrong), and large parts of it are going to be reclaimed by the ocean, as per the 1958 warning by Frank Capra. (LINK)
And the Trump administration is De Santis writ large, without any of Governor Scott’s equivocation…
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.
Forty seven years ago, on this day, March 8th, 1978,
Senator WEBSTER (VICTORIA) (Minister for Science) – The baseline air pollution station at Cape Grim in Tasmania is viewed by the Government as being a particularly important installation. I have visited the base on one or two occasions and noted when I was there recently that there have been some results from the monitoring that has taken place. The honourable senator will know that monitoring has been in progress at Cape Grim since 1976 only. The tests which are currently being carried out there are particularly important so far as environmental conditions are concerned. Indeed, they might have much wider implications than just the effect of the environment. For instance, the surface ozone levels are being tested, as are the carbon dioxide levels, concentrations of carbon tetrachloride and fluoro carbons- that is, Freon-ll, which is discussed regularly as being an important constituent to monitor.
The period of measurement has been very short and I understand that no firm conclusion can be drawn on any trends which might be occurring within these programs. The results which have been obtained at Cape Grim to date suggest that carbon dioxide and Freon-ll are increasing as constituents in the atmosphere coming to Cape Grim. That is fairly important. Further data is required before it can be established whether these increased concentrations are part of a cyclical variation over a longer period or whether they are in actual fact indicative of a very definite trend in the atmosphere. That is the reason for the establishment of this baseline air pollution station, which is one of a group of stations placed around the world to monitor the atmosphere and to attempt to establish a baseline.
The Government intends in the future to establish the station permanently. Its management is under the control of the Department of Science, with the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation playing an important role. We have put additional facilities and equipment down there within the last year. It is my wish that in the near future we shall see some move towards the establishment of a permanent station there.
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 335ppm. As of 2025 it is 427ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The context was that a few months earlier, the National Academy of Science in the US had released a report on energy and climate, and this had made front page news in the Canberra Times on sea level rise, etc.
Cape Grim as a measuring facility had been open for a couple of years. The CSIRO had an interest in CO2 build up, and was involved in some of the early work, especially Barrie Pittock and Graham Pearman ,and some politicians were aware of what was going on.
What I think we can learn from this is that we’ve been able to measure our doom for a long time, watching it unfold. The ultimate “press” disturbance.
What happened next
CO2, build-up kept bubbling under, bubbling through, an issue finally, finally broke through into public awareness in 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.
Thirty four years ago, on this day, March 7th, 1991, Senator Graham Richardson was claiming
‘Australia’s commitment was “the most progressive policy, I might say, of any nation in combating the threat of greenhouse climate change.’”
Senate Hansard 1439 (source)
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 354ppm. As of 2025 it is 427ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The context was that Graham Richardson had been the Federal Environment Minister between ‘87 and ‘90 and had pushed through various useful bits of legislation and tried to push others. But after the March 1990 election, he had expected to get and was promised, according to him – Defense, and then was given it, and then it was taken away. Hawke hadn’t done his numbers correctly, and Richardson was pissed and was secretly working for Keating, who, by this time, was glowering on the back benches. I don’t know the specifics of why Richardson was boasting about this, but presumably someone will have made a jibe about Labor’s position.
What I think we can learn from this
Labor was still boasting its environmental credentials. This would change under Keating, who was kind of a proto camera, and got rid of all the green crap and stop talking about amorphous issues.
What happened next
Richardson became Environment Minister again, very briefly in 1994, before being replaced by John Faulkner. Richardson then lurched further and further to the right, though he’d always been on the right of the Labor Party.
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 1st, 1970,
In 1970, New Republic was moved to describe the American environmental movement as “the biggest assortment of ill-matched allies since the Crusades- young and old, radicals of left and right. Liberals and conservatives, humanists and scientists, atheists and deists.” In his study of American environmentalism, Joseph Petulla identifies three main traditions: the biocentric (nature for and in itself), the ecologic (based on scientific understanding of interrelationships and interdependence among the parts of natural communities), and the economic (the optimal use of natural resources, otherwise described as the utilitarian approach to conservation).
(McCormick, 1991:ix)
New Republic 1 March, 1970, 8-9.
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 at the beginning of 1969 the Santa Barbara OilSpill and the publication of the Earthrise photo got people thinking about degradation and destruction of the planet. And folks who were fed up with or not into protesting about the Vietnam War and getting their heads pummeled now had a different issue. But as the quote above suggests, everyone was “talking about it”, and that surely meant that a coalition or “alliance” or coalitions and alliances wouldn’t hold. People’s pre-existing cognitive perspectives and material interests would reassert themselves.
And so it came to pass within three years, especially after the 1972 Stockholm conference and the creation of various institutions like the EPA, the “broad support” had evaporated like morning mist.
What I think we can learn from this is that everyone can agree that “something must be done”, fewer on what that something is. And fewer still will take the action to try and make it happen. Others will be content with this or that shiny bauble to make themselves feel good..
What happened next
The first big eco wave had crashed along on the rocks of oil, energy, exhaustion, etc, by 1973.
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.
Climate scientist Professor Kevin Anderson weighed in on the debate on whether the recent warming is beyond what the models predict, pointing out that “it’s not just the scale of change, it’s the timeline of that scale of change. And that’s the real difference between Hansen and Mann. Really, it is one of timeline. They both end up being in a terrible place. The Hansen analysis gets us there a little sooner than that of Mann, but in the absence of deep and rapid cuts in emissions both are going to get there.”
I see a lot of good reasons to be taking more notice of the Hansen end of the spectrum. But as with all science, there’s a range of uncertainty that comes out of equally robust analysis. So Mann’s analysis could be correct, and so could Hansen’s, and we can’t, we can’t know which of those are more accurate until we get an improved understanding and more empirical data.
But does that affect our policy framework? No, not really. Risk is an important part of policy, risk and uncertainty. So we should start planning for the repercussions of the Hansen end of the spectrum being correct. The consequences of Mann analysis are pretty disastrous anyway, but Hansen’s conclusions land more within a dire to catastrophic framing. And from a responsible political perspective, I think we have to lean our policies more towards the worst case than hoping for more optimistic interpretations to play in our favour.
As it is today policy makers fail to have the courage or clarity of vision to even grapple with the Mann end of the spectrum. To put it bluntly, at both the global and national level the policy realm embeds a soft form of denial.
The interview covered a range of topics, and will be released in portions. You can read the first part here. It was conducted by Dr Marc Hudson, who has interviewed Professor Anderson on several occasions over the past 15 years. Dr Hudson runs All Our Yesterdays, an “on this day” website about climate politics, technology, protest that covered events from 1661 to the present day.
The transcript of the relevant portion of the interview can be found below.
You are free (and of course encouraged) to use this material for commercial or non-commercial purposes. Please cite both the source (i.e. that the interview was conducted by Marc Hudson, and the URL of this page.
Give me the conch back.Two observations and the next question. Observation one is in the 60s and 70s, or early 70s, it was this toss up between, “are we going to freeze or are we going to burn?” Obviously, the science has come on a very long way, but we’re kind of still in the same place and interesting.
And then I’m reminded of the late, great Wally Broecker, the oceanographer, who said of ocean currents and climate, that we were poking the beast with a sharp stick, and there might be trouble if we woke the beast up. I think the beast is snuffling. And in that pre awake, yes, pre awake phase,
OK. Next question. So here’s my rough characterization. There is “Team Michael Mann” that says, you know “the temperature anomalies of 2023 24 while surprising, are within what the models kind of suggest and expect and quote.‘The truth is bad enough.’” And then there is “Team Hansen with people like James Hansen, Leon Simons, saying, “no, no. no no The lessening of the sulfates from the marine pollution and other factors means that the models that we have been using, including the IPCC, are no longer adequate.”
And even Gavin Schmidt, they would say, is having to admit that he’s confused [Guardian]. And you know, Gavin Schmidt is kind of at the smart end, shall we say, of climate scientists.
So where is Kevin Anderson? Is he firmly in the camp of … First is this a fair characterization of the debates that are happening among the scientists? Or is it. unfair? And second question is, where does Kevin Anderson fit? Is he Team Mann or Team Hansen, or is he a substitute, or is he playing a different game altogether?
Kevin Anderson 10:14
I see a lot of good reasons to be taking more notice of the Hansen end of the spectrum. But as with all science, there’s a range of uncertainty that comes out of equally robust analysis. So Mann’s analysis could be correct, and so could Hansen’s, and we can’t know which of those are more accurate until we get an improved understanding and more empirical data.
But does that affect our policy framework? No, not really. Risk is an important part of policy, risk and uncertainty. So we should start planning for the repercussions of the Hansen end of the spectrum being correct. The consequences of Mann analysis are pretty disastrous anyway, but Hansen’s conclusions land more within a dire to catastrophic framing. And from a responsible political perspective, I think we have to lean our policies more towards the worst case than hoping for more optimistic interpretations to play in our favour.
As it is today policy makers fail to have the courage or clarity of vision to even grapple with the Mann end of the spectrum. To put it bluntly, at both the global and national level the policy realm embeds a soft form of denial. There’s an acceptance of the science, but a denial of the need to act accordingly; behind the eloquence and rhetoric, fingers remain firmly crossed that we’ll somehow be ok.
marc hudson 11:48
Don’t talk about the airport expansion. That’s my next question.
Kevin Anderson 11:52
Is it. Okay.
Thinking about how we, the academic and wilder climate expert realm, engage with policy makers, I see it incumbent on us to start by asking what does the policy landscape look like if we’re to deliver the deep cuts in emissions needed in a climate emergency? But also, of course, how on earth do we adapt? How do we, and the ‘we’ is important in this, adapt to the scale of change that is implied by the Hansen framing of these issues?”
And it’s not just the scale of change, it’s the timeline of that scale of change. And that’s the real difference between Hansen and Mann. Really, it is one of timeline. They both end up being in a terrible place. The Hansen analysis gets us there a little sooner than that of Mann, but in the absence of deep and rapid cuts in emissions both are going to get there.
marc hudson 12:44
We’ve had these warnings since 1988 in public,
Yep
and from scientists since late 70s. I think it’s fair to say
Yep
though you can, you can heckle me when I’m doing my presentation, because I cover this though. The omens – if past performance is the best indicator of future performance – the omens are not good.
For more of Kevin’s work see climateuncensored.com
Tomorrow’s blog post – UK aviation emissions and the proposed Third Runway at Heathrow.
Forty four years ago, on this day, February 19th, 1981, Nature publishes an article, by Wendy Barnaby, about an Earthscan meeting the previous week in Stockholm,
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 340ppm. As of 2025 it is 427ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The context was that the OECD and the IEA – and other bodies – were beginning to hold meetings about energy and environment and especially climate, in the context of the second oil shock the tail end of the 70s, thanks to the overthrow of the Shah.
The other context was that the United States Council on Environmental Quality had been trying to get things moving, but now Reagan was present with his goons, (and see the end of the article before the greenhouse one in the screengrab above! – it all looked a little unsure about what would happen.
And this is also in the context of the First World Climate Conference, which had taken place in February of 1979, Nature had an interesting relationship with carbon dioxide build up, shall we say, with its erstwhile editor, John Maddox, being a vehement opponent of the theory up until and including 1987 (he seems to have climbed down from this by 1995).
What I think we can learn from this is that in the late 70s, early 80s, there was a flurry of activity, awareness, and slowly growing consensus.
What happened next There was a flurry of reporting in New Scientist, the FT etc. A documentary, “Warming Warning”, by Richard Broadwas broadcast the end of that year, in part inspired by this report in Nature and other accounts.
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…
Thirty three years ago, on this day, February 12th, 1992, Liberal Party John Hewson decides to give up on pretending to give a shit about “the environment”.
The federal coalition will reconsider its radical position on curbing emission of greenhouse gasses.
The Opposition Leader, Dr Hewson, said yesterday that he had asked the environment spokesman, Mr Chaney, to review the Opposition’s policy of endorsing a target of a 20 per cent reduction in these emissions by 2000.
Grattan, M. 1992. Coalition To Rethink Greenhouse Policy. The Age, 13 February, p.3.
[Here ends the competitive consensus!!]
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 356ppm. As of 2025 it is 426ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The context was the Libs had gone to the 1990 election trying to win over small g green voters because (big G green voters didn’t exist) and were unsuccessful and believed that they were stabbed in the back. The new Liberal leader John Hewon, was looking forward to the 1993 election, which he must have felt fairly confident that he was going to win, given the recession that we had to have, which had Paul Keating’s name all over it. Keating was by now installed as prime minister, and so Hewson was looking to, in the words of a later conservative leader, cut the green crap.
This was noticed, at the time, by the way. See this
“According to the director of science and technology policy at Murdoch University, Fightback would result in a six per cent increase in car use immediately, and 28 per cent in a few years.
The table shows that Australia is the third worst polluter in the OECD region and that our poor performance is very much related to low fossil-fuel prices.
If Australia is to get its carbon emissions down to a level comparable with other OECD countries, some form of carbon tax will have to be introduced.
International pressure to move in this direction is likely to intensify over the next decade.”
Davidson, K. 1993. Hewson Error Of Emission.The Age, 11 February, p.13.
What I think we can learn from this is the Libs had a policy. It didn’t serve them with the electorate. They ditched it, and they never got it back, and this was the moment when Hewson ditched it.
What happened next Hewson lost the unlosable election in part thanks to a birthday cake and how much his flat tax would cost. But now goes around bleating on about the environment and saying Market Forces are gonna fix it. Australia has been so badly let down by its political and economic “elite”. Buncha idiots at absolute best.
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.
