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Fifteen years ago, on this day, April 20th, 2009, the Australian Chief Scientist tried to inject some urgency into the policy debate…,

The Government’s chief scientist wants the country to set the toughest possible targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions, warning that action must begin now against climate change.

The Government has committed to cutting Australia’s emissions by 5 to 15 percent of 2000 levels by 2020 and wants to start an emissions trading scheme next year.

However, the target has been slammed by the Greens and environmental groups as being too low and the Opposition has also recently signalled it would support a stronger cut in emissions.

Professor Penny Sackett would not put an exact figure on what she thought the target should be but she said she has advised the Government to set the steepest target possible.

Anon. 2009. World has 6 years to act on climate change. ABC,, April 20

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 387.6ppm. As of 2024 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that the Rudd Government had been selling out the future by allowing lobbyists for the oil and gas and coal industries to chip away and chip away at the already initially piss-weak ambition of the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme. It was about to be introduced to Parliament, and presumably Penny Sackett, Chief Scientific Adviser was trying to stiffen everyone’s resolve so that further compromises would be minimal. Well, ideally, ambition will be ramped up, but no, it’s a ratchet. 

What we learn is that scientists are largely powerless in these matters and all they can do is speak truth to power and power will ignore them and so it came to pass. 

What happened next? Rudd’s Piss-weak and ever pisser weaker legislation was defeated because of Tony Abbott. And because the Greens decided something bad would come along, Rudd was toppled the following year. And Sackett resigned in April 2011 without giving a reason, but this has shed some light on why she might have done that. 

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 20, 2006 – David Cameron does “hug-a-husky” to detoxify the Conservative “brand”

April 20, 1998 – National Academy of Sciences vs “Oregon petition” fraud

Fourteen years ago, on this day, April 20th, 2010, another of those normal accidents happened…,

2010 Deepwater Horizon rig explodes

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 the clue is in the name, Deepwater and Horizon, both implying that we’re having to go further and further to find oil, that the energy return on investment is lowering and it’s getting riskier. And so it did. The context was that we’ve been extracting oil. If you don’t count Burma for 170 years, we’re very good at it. If by good you want to overlook the inevitable leaks, and the inevitable tanker disasters, these normal accidents. 

What we learn Is that accidents happen. Normal accidents happen…

What happened next, BP tried to dodge the blame with a certain amount of success. The marine environments were devastated. people’s livelihoods were devastated. But we’ve moved on… other disasters we can expect. And there’s the Onion story, clearly inspired by Deepwater Horizon…

Millions Of Barrels Of Oil Safely Reach Port In Major Environmental Catastrophe

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 20, 2006 – David Cameron does “hug-a-husky” to detoxify the Conservative “brand”

April 20, 1998 – National Academy of Sciences vs “Oregon petition” fraud

On this day four years ago, February 22 2020, a pipeline carrying carbon dioxide ruptured. It turns out that Carbon Dioxide is Not Good For You…

It was just after 7 p.m. when residents of Satartia, Mississippi, started smelling rotten eggs. Then a greenish cloud rolled across Route 433 and settled into the valley surrounding the little town. Within minutes, people were inside the cloud, gasping for air, nauseated and dazed.

Some two dozen individuals were overcome within a few minutes, collapsing in their homes; at a fishing camp on the nearby Yazoo River; in their vehicles. Cars just shut off, since they need oxygen to burn fuel. Drivers scrambled out of their paralyzed vehicles, but were so disoriented that they just wandered around in the dark.

https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/gassing-satartia-mississippi-co2-pipeline_n_60ddea9fe4b0ddef8b0ddc8f

The context

Pipelines are everywhere, transporting things we rely on without even knowing about. It’s only when something goes wrong (and things always go wrong, eventually) that you notice.  The broader context is that the CCS proponents are suggesting an INSANELY LARGE number of pipelines, built almost instantaneously.  Yeah, that’s gonna happen…

What we learn

Normal accidents will happen. And we never learn, really, because that would require close and sustained attention of those with power…

What happened next

It oddly didn’t get a lot of global coverage. But it will if pipelines from capture sites (be they power plants or from “Direct Air Capture” start springing up…

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

https://eu.desmoinesregister.com/story/money/agriculture/2022/09/11/here-minute-details-2020-mississippi-co-2-pipeline-leak-rupture-denbury-gulf-coast/8015510001/

https://www.npr.org/2023/05/21/1172679786/carbon-capture-carbon-dioxide-pipeline

https://www.theverge.com/2021/8/26/22642806/co2-pipeline-explosion-satartia-mississippi-carbon-capture

https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/gassing-satartia-mississippi-co2-pipeline_n_60ddea9fe4b0ddef8b0ddc8f

https://www.desmog.com/2023/09/14/satartia-disaster-an-anomaly-james-millar-damage-control-carbon-capture-canada/#:~:text=A%2024%2Dinch%20pipeline%20exploded,concerns%20that%20mention%20the%20incident.

CO2 Pipelines and Carbon Capture: The Satartia Mississippi Accident Investigation

Also on this day: 

Feb 22, 2000 – Japanese coal-burning to be dealt with by Australian trees?

February 22, 2013 – Idiotic “Damage” astroturf attempted by miners

Fifty-five years ago, on this day, February 11th, 1970.

Two things on this day.

One is a European Conservation Year event with Prince Philip and Anthony Crosland, who was still the relevant Secretary of State  as reported in The Spectator by one Stanley Johnson (the wife beater).

And

Showing of Shell-Mex and BP film “Environment in the Balance” – (see issue 2 of “Your Environment”) 

Here’s the beginning of a review from the second issue of Your Environment…

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 324ppm. As of 2024 it is 422ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that everyone had started wringing their hands about conservation issues, and the European Year of Conservation Year had been announced and was providing an opportunity for this sort of nonsense. Then in the evening in London, there was a showing of a BP film “Environment in the Balance.”  BP had been making so-called educational films – you could also call them propaganda –  for years. And this film was typical hand-wringing, pushing the responsibility on to individuals. 

What we learn is that everyone was running around at this point, saying that “something must be done.”  And that would go on for a couple more years, until they stopped saying it because they were bored, hearing themselves say it, and because it was clear that nothing was going to be done. 

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: 

February 11, 1993 – Liberal Party plans would not meet climate goals, says expert

Feb 11, 1994 – President Clinton proclaims the end of environmental racism.  Yeah, right.

Feb 11, 1980 – First UK Government climate report released.

Twenty six years ago, on this day, December 31, 1997, the Federal environment minister Robert Hill took a pop at the peak green group in Australia.

“THE Australian Conservation Foundation claims that opinion polls show Australians “do not agree with the Government’s push for the right to increase our greenhouse gases while other countries reduce” (Kyoto Harmed Our Reputation, Letters, 22/12).

“Perhaps if the ACF and others had not embarked on a deliberate campaign of misinformation on the greenhouse issue the results may have been different.”

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 364ppm. As of 2023 it is 421ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that the Australian government had extorted an eye-wateringly generous deal at Kyoto. Robert Hill had got a standing ovation from the Liberal party room – or possibly the cabinet I forget the details – but Australian environmentalists were understandably really horrified that the whole process had been treated just so shabbily and went public.

What I think we can learn from this is that when push comes to shove, well, states are going to defend existing powerful interests in most circumstances rather than think about the future. And individual functionaries will not take kindly to being reminded of their shabby behaviour.

What happened next

Hill signed the Kyoto protocol in April 1998. His boss John Howard clearly didn’t want it to be brought forward to the Australian Parliament for ratification and he made sure that it wasn’t, finally announcing this on Earth Day, in June of 2002.

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

Hill, R. 1997. There was no `diplomatic tension’ at Kyoto. The Australian, December 31

First thing is – I screwed up, and there’s absolutely nobody else to blame.

I posted yesterday this blog post.

It’s something that I wrote the first draft of a year ago, and had updated at some point since.

The problem with it is that the quoted scientist, Mike Pentz, was not warning about C02 build-up, but rather ‘waste heat’. If I had been paying closer attention, I would have spotted that.

The consequence is that I’ve put out a blog post (and it gained some traction – a bunch of likes and retweets) which is inaccurate, which pisses me off.

Fortunately, someone on Twitter, Mike Holderness, very kindly pointed out my error. See here.

The whole story – that some scientists were worried about an ice age from all the dusty and aerosols (Reid Bryson, and early Stephen Schneider), while others worried about ‘waste heat’ (Howard Wilcox, Mike Pentz) while still others (Keeling, Bolin, Flohn, MacDonald, Commoner, Kingsley Dunham, etc) were worried about carbon dioxide – is a MORE interesting version than what I told.

So, that means that a) people have been misled (albeit unintentionally) by me and b) I look like either i) I don’t know what I am talking about or ii) I am deliberately over-egging the pudding (which I don’t need to do – there are plenty of earlier-than-1973 examples of carbon dioxide warnings). Not a good day’s work…

It happened, as far as I can reconstruct, because I was so taken with the opportunity for a “50 years” post (I do like my round numbers) and didn’t read the article carefully enough. Then there was the symmetry with the Canberra Times article comparing climate to nuclear war… So, I saw what I wanted/needed to see, and didn’t double-check…

Can this be avoided in future? Well, I can try, but to be honest, in the absence of someone vetting every single post, I can’t exclude the possibility that it will recur. If it does I’ll do a retraction/explanation.

Sixteen years ago, on this day, December 12, 2007, Canada leaves Kyoto Protocol as Australia formally joins

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 384ppm. As of 2023 it is 421ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that a COP was taking place in Bali Indonesia that was all about what would happen after the Kyoto Protocol period was over 2008 to 2012.

The Canadians under Stephen Harper were clearly not going to hit their targets and Harper, a conservative, was throwing red meat to his side in removing Canada.

The Australian story was the opposite: Kevin Rudd had used Kyoto and lack of ratification as a way of painting then Prime Minister John Howard as a dinosaur ahead of the November 2007 federal election. One of his first acts as Prime Minister was to announce that Australia would ratify the Kyoto Protocol.

What I think we can learn from this

Day-to-day-to-year politics mean that no agreement is particularly safe. 

There is also a lot of symbolism going on – see the “veil of Kyoto” article.

What happened next

Rudd, at Bali, refused to go along with European requests for Australia to have a higher emissions reduction target than its pitiful current level – a sign of problems to come.

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..