Category: United Kingdom

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Business Responses United Kingdom

April 24, 2004 – Launch of the Climate Group

Twenty-years ago, on this day, April 24th, 2004, the business outfit the “Climate Group” was launched, with a speech by Tony Blair.

24 April 2004 Launch of the Climate Group. Blair speaks at it.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/3662303.stm

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 377.7ppm. As of 2024 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that the UNFCCC process was potentially coming back on board with Kyoto moving towards ratification. Businesses were worrying. The Global Climate Coalition was dead. There was a space for new business activity. And along comes the Climate Group launched today but probably conceived a couple of years before. 

What we learn is that the early 2000s mark a kind of shift, there is that split in business between what the headbangers have wanted and succeeded in destroying, i.e. destroying high ambition. And then there’s all the other companies, which might make money from the green transition, or can just read a bloody Keeling curve, and see that there’s trouble ahead. 

What happened next, the Climate Group had its peak years probably in the run up to Copenhagen. It’s still going. I’m not quite sure why. There is now a coalition called “we mean business” as well. But there’s always a proliferation of these groups, I guess, representing slightly different interests and making work for well-meaning but fundamentally dim technocrats.

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 24, 1980 – the climate models are sound…

April 24, 1994 – a carbon tax for Australia?

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United Kingdom

April 22, 1965 – Manchester Evening News article on C02 and global warming

Fifty nine years ago, on this day, April 22nd, 1965, the Manchester Evening News ran another article warning about carbon dioxide build up,

22 April 1965 Article about C02 and global warming in Manchester Evening News

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 320ppm. As of 2024 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that a couple of months earlier, Lyndon Johnson, as President of the United States, had made a special address to Congress, which mentioned CO2 buildup, and other scientists were sniffing around the issue. The Evening News has talked about carbon dioxide buildup before but this was a pretty clear case. 

What we learn is that if you were a tolerably intelligent person with a tolerably decent memory, and I don’t know, O-level chemistry and physics, you’d have understood the climate issue from them a lot earlier than I thought even a couple of years ago. 

What happened next Manchester Evening News very periodically covered the issue. So did everyone. But it wasn’t really until ‘69 – 70 that it got any traction, and then it went away again until 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.

Also on this day: 

April 22, 1975 – UK Civil Service scratches its head on #climate

April 22, 1993 – Clinton’s announcement used by anti-carbon pricing Aussies

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United Kingdom United Nations United States of America

April 18, 1970 – Harold Wilson in York, bigging up UN, rights/obligations

Fifty four years ago, on this day, April 18th, 1970, UK Prime Minister Harold Wilson was trying to get some kudos for wrapping himself in the issue of the day…,

In April 1970, Wilson gave a speech to the United Nations Association in York, in which he espoused the virtues of international cooperation on the environment: 

We need a new charter of international rights – and obligations. This is how it might read. All States have a common interest in the beneficial management of the natural resources of the Earth. All States should cooperate in the prevention or control of physical changes in the environment which may jeopardise the quality of human life, and which may endanger the health or the survival of animals or plants.102

102 TNA: FCO 55/429, Prime Minister’s Address to Annual General Meeting of the United Nations Association in York, 18 April 1970

(Sims, 2016: 212)

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 325ppm. As of 2024 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that Harold Wilson had been talking about environmental issues since September of the previous year, at the Labour Party Conference, in  a period of competitive consensus. In January he gave a speech up in New York about a new special relationship on pollution. The Conservatives were yapping at his heels. Wilson in his head was probably thinking about the next election. And the green issue was an important one for voters. This is long before the Ecology party, which later became the Green Party. 

What we learn is that there was a period of alarm and competitive consensus in the late 60s early 70s. And compare and contrast that with what happened in the periods of 2006 to 2008. And the coupled lack of ambition in 2023-4. We’re so doomed.

What happened next? Well, a month later, the first ever Environment White Paper was released. It mentioned carbon dioxide buildup as a potential issue. Wilson then went on to lose the June 1970 election. He returned to office in 74 and stepped down in 76. 

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 18, 1989 – begging letter to world leaders sent

April 18, 2013, Liberal Party bullshit about “soil carbon” revealed to be bullshit

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United Kingdom

April 15, 1969-  Coventry lecture – Mellanby says Air Pollution could cause flood…

Fifty five years ago, on this day, April 15th, 1969, a well-known British Scientist was sounding the alarm.

Anon, 1969. Air Pollution Could Cause Flood- Expert. Coventry Evening Telegraph, April 16, p.10

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 326.4ppm. As of 2024 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that more and more senior British scientists were switching on to the danger of carbon dioxide. And Mellanby was one of the first, maybe first, to make a public song and dance about it.

What we learn is that well, whoever went to that event in Coventry in 1969, will have been sensitised to the issue.

What happened next? Mellanby kept talking about it. Mellanby was okay with the Blueprint for Survival of January 1972.

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 15, 1965 – Murray Bookchin warns about carbon dioxide build-up

April 15, 1974 – war criminal Henry Kissinger gives climate danger speech

April 15, 1974 – Kissinger cites climate concerns…

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United Kingdom

April 12, 1955 – Coventry Evening Telegraph – “Melting Ice Could Menace the World”

Sixty nine years ago, on this day, April 12th, 1955, a regional newspaper in England explained what was coming.

Anon, 1955. Melting Ice Could Menace the World. Coventry Evening Telegraph April 12 p.7

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 314ppm. As of 2024 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that there was, for many years, a consensus that the world was warming up. It wasn’t quite so clear what was causing it. This article explicitly mentions carbon dioxide as one possible culprit.

What we learn is that the idea of the world warming was not particularly controversial. But the mechanism was, and what Gilbert Plass, drawing on Guy Callendar, did was give a plausible explanation. That’s a really important distinction, something I hadn’t quite figured out.

What we learn is that the British regional press back at this time was still worthy of the name more or less (though I’m sure it didn’t feel to campaigners at the time that it was!). One mustn’t look at the past with rose-tinted glasses. 

What happened next The Coventry Evening Telegraph did keep reporting on the issue. There was just a general awareness that things were warming up, and that there might be trouble ahead.

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 12, 1992 – seminar asks “How sustainable is Australian Energy?” (proposes switch to gas)

April 12, 1993 – “environmental economics” gets a puff piece

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United Kingdom

March 31, 1973 – Protest in Piccadilly Circus

Fifty one years ago, on this day, March 31st, 1973, there was a demo in London.  

We found out about it first when we went down on 31 March to London, where Commitment were blocking off Piccadilly Circus from cars. There were about 400 people there and a lot of police, who swooped in and arrested the obvious ringleaders”. The attempt to block the road was in fact not much of a success as most of the remaining protesters seemed unwilling to do anything. “I ended up as one of the organisers – it became that ridiculous!”

http://www.muthergrumble.co.uk/issue17/mg1708.htm

Horace Herring, H. 2003. Energy Utopianism p.104

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 329ppm. As of 2024 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that the Young Liberals had been banging the drum about environmental issues. There had already been a similar style protests in 1971. This one seems to have garnered even less press but will have influenced some people I guess? The war against the car or the war against motorists. What can you do? What a species we are! 

What we can learn is that antipathy towards cars being taken over by cities goes back a long way. “Reclaim the Streets” goes back a long way. And our failure to succeed goes back a long way. 

What happened next, Commitment could not be maintained. But people within it stayed committed to the broader cause of ecological sanity. Including Victor Anderson…

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: 

March 31, 1998 – another report about #climate and business in the UK

March 31, 1998 – two business-friendly climate events in UK and Australia

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United Kingdom

March 29, 1979 – Health impacts of carbon dioxide discussed…

Forty five years ago, on this day, March 29th, 1979, a health conference in Eastbourne hears mention of the C02 problem.

Robson, A. 1979. “Environmental Implications of Fossil-Fuelled Power” https://doi.org/10.1177/146642407909900608

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 337ppm. As of 2024 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context is that by the late 70s, there are questions being asked in Parliament, there are newspaper articles. There was an especial flurry in ‘76-77 about whether carbon dioxide buildup is indeed changing the planet. And the First World Climate Conference has just happened. The Central Electricity Generating Board has had its eye on the issue. And so it’s unsurprising perhaps, that it should be mentioned, albeit in passing, at a conference about health.

What we learn is this idea that carbon dioxide and climate change might have impacts on health goes back a lot further than 2016 or whenever. And we have been failing to do anything about this issue for a lot longer than we like to admit. 

What happened next, climate didn’t really climb on to the health agenda until well, 10 years later, when “the greenhouse effect” started to punch people in the face. 

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: 

March 29, 1993 – C02 Disposal symposium takes place in Oxford

March 29, 1995- Kuwaiti scientist says if global warming happening, it’s not fossil fuels. #MRDA

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Sea level rise United Kingdom

March 11, 1959 – Warmer Arctic Raising World’s Sea Level…

Sixty five years ago, on this day, March 11th, 1959, in the aftermath of the International Geophysical Year…

A general warming up of Arctic waters and a receding of glaciers means that the average sea level of the world is rising. In the South of England this rise will be 6in in the next 100 years. This will necessitate, said Dr. D.C. Martin, assistant secretary of the Royal Society, higher sea walls to protect highly populated industrial areas below the level of ordinary spring tides. He was speaking at the Royal Society of Arts in London yesterday on “Some achievements of the International Geophysical Year.”

March 11 1959 – Smith,A. (1959) Warmer Arctic Raising World’s Sea Level. Telegraph and Morning Post, March 12, p.15

p.415-6 – Martin did NOT link it explicitly to c02 buildup

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 316ppm. As of 2024 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that the International Geophysical Year, which lasted 18 months, had ended in December 1958, three months earlier. There were masses of data to be crunched. It seemed fairly clear that the world was indeed warming, which had been noted for a few decades really, and that therefore, a certain amount of polar ice would indeed melt. This was accepted without necessarily being ascribed to carbon dioxide. This is an important point. At that point people saw other contenders for the causative agent for this warming –  orbital wobbles the activity of the Sun, something else.  DC Martin had been up to his neck in the BBC television programme The Restless Sphere. (Interesting guy. Further action, look at the Royal Society archives for that period.) 

What I think we can learn from this

Symptoms and causes are not self-evident. You shouldn’t mistake acceptance of the existence of symptoms as a consensus around what only later is revealed to be the accurate diagnosis.

What happened next The Royal Society got more involved in the meteorology stuff. especially by the end of the 1960s.

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: 

March 11, 1969 – NASA explains need to monitor C02 build-up to politicians

March 11, 1989 – warm words at The Hague, where the climate criminals should be sent…

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United Kingdom

March 2, 1954 – UK newspaper readers get Greenhouse lesson from Ritchie-Calder

Seventy years ago, on this day, March 2nd, 1954, Peter Ritchie Calder, the Scottish public intellectual, wrote about carbon dioxide build-up for a popular audience, in a major British newspaper.

It is happening: but authorities are not agreed why.

One popular theory is carbon dioxide in the air.

Normally  air contains only 0.03 per cent of this gas, which acts  like greenhouse glass.  It lets the sun’s rays through to  heat the ground and then traps this radiant heat, which remains to warm air and ground.

Experiments indicate there  is a tenth more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere than 50 years ago. This could account for that 2 deg. F.  rise.

But why has it increased?  Is it man-made? It is estimated that each year 6,000 million tons of carbon dioxide pour into the atmosphere from burning coal.

Ritchie-Calder, P. (1954) Who Said it’s getting colder! News Chronicle, 2 March, p.4.

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 314ppm. As of 2024 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that in May 1953, Canadian physicist Gilbert Plass had made an announcement at the American Geophysical Union meeting about the consequences of CO2 buildup, although it got no attention in the quality British dailies. Someone like Peter Richie Calder, who was extremely scientifically literate and hooked into UNESCO would have known about it. The timing indicates that this might come from an early read of a UNESCO Courier article by Gerald Wendt. 

What I think we can learn from this is that readers of a newspaper like the News Chronicle, which was left-wing-ish were introduced to the idea of carbon dioxide buildup as early as 1954, 70 years ago.

What happened next

Richie-Calder kept being a public intellectual and kept warning about climate change. Three examples will suffice in 1963. He talked to the Town and Country Planning Association in 1968. He had carbon dioxide buildup as one of the possible mechanisms for how on earth his presidential address to the Conservation Society in November 1958. And then, very shortly after that, he had an interview with a BBC researcher for Horizon ”Muck Today, Poison tomorrow”, where he also raised the co2 issue. 

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: 

March 2nd, 1997- RIP Judi Bari

March 2, 2009 –  Washington DC coal plant gets blockaded

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United Kingdom

March 1, 1967 – Carbon dioxide as important waste problem

Fifty seven years ago, on this day, March 1st, 1967, a London audience heard mention of carbon dioxide build-up.

THE DISPOSAL OF COMMUNAL WASTE

 A paper by  H. R. OAKLEY , M.Sc., M.I.C.E. read to the Society on Wednesday 1st March 1967

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 322ppm. As of 2024 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures.

The context was that Barry Commoner’s book Science and Survival had come out the previous September in the UK. It received favourable reviews. It mentioned carbon dioxide buildup. In January of that year, there had been a television programme on the BBC called Challenge, directed by the late Roy Battersby, which had also mentioned CO2 buildup. 

So, while it is surprising, perhaps to think of people in 1967, explicitly referencing carbon dioxide buildup in speeches about disposal of waste, it’s not actually that surprising. 

What we can learn is that we have known about a potential issue for a lot longer than is commonly thought, but that we were unable to turn this individual awareness and potential worry into anything sustained. Because we as a species can’t really cope with uncertainty and fear, especially if it’s an apocalypse of our own making. People tend to give up on fighting the system for very understandable reasons; because the system wins! And they retreat either into physical escapes or mental escapes. 

What happened next? 

Well, the carbon dioxide buildup issue kept being discussed by 1969 it was relatively prominent. And in August 1970, the first British state pushback happened. 

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: 

March 1, 1954 – Lucky Dragon incident gives the world the word “fall out”

March 1st 2010 – scientist grilled over nothing burger…