Category: United States of America

Categories
United States of America

February 28, 1984 – Carbon Dioxide and the Greenhouse Effect hearings

Forty years ago, on this day, February 28th, 1984, Al Gore and other politicians (Republicans too) held hearings, and not the first, about carbon dioxide build-up.

Carbon Dioxide and the Greenhouse Effect, hearings of House Committee on Science and Technology, 98th Congress, Feb 28 1984.

https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=umn.31951d00275567u&view=1up&seq=3 

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 344.8ppm. As of 2024 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that people like Gore, were interested in the climate issue and in close contact with Roger Revelle (who had taught Gore at Harvard), James Hansen, etc. There had been hearings in 1982. And in September 1983 the Environmental Protection Agency had put out a report on “Can we delay a greenhouse warming?” (the answer was “almost certainly not”.)

What we learn is that holding hearings is a relatively straightforward way of well, “hearing,” the latest science, showing your voters that you care, disseminating the message; you might even make it newsworthy (as had happened in 1982). So it’s a good tactic. Like any tactic, it can be overused. 

What happened next, Gore and other senators kept plugging away. After the Villach conference in 1985 in October 1985, they had a bit more of a fire in their belly about it. And they managed to get Carl Sagan, who was a rock star, and others. And then they finally broke through in ‘88, with drought, heatwaves and James Hansen…

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: 

 Feb 28, 2003- Australian business lobby switches from opposition to “no position” on Kyoto ratification #auspol

 February 28, 2010 – Australian Prime Minister says won’t walk away from climate. (Then does, obvs.)

Categories
Denial United States of America

February 22, 1991 – Denialist gloating about influence on Bush

Thirty three years ago, on this day, February 22nd, 1991, a super-annuated physicist suffering Relevance Deprivation Syndrome, was boasting of his influence (probably fairly accurately, sad to say).

In a February 1991 letter to the vice president of the American Petroleum Institute, Robert Jastrow crowed , “It is generally considered in the scientific community that the Marshall report was responsible for the Administration’s opposition to carbon taxes and restrictions on fossil fuel consumption. Quoting New Scientist magazine, he reported that the Marshall Institute “is still the controlling influence in the White House.”

(Oreskes and Conway, 2010:190) [letter dated 22nd February]

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 355.8ppm. As of 2024 it is 422ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that from 1989 the George C. Marshall Institute and the Global Climate Coalition had been leading a public assault on the science and scientists. They were winning some victories, undeniably. Jastrow was motivated to overplay the George C. Marshall Institute’s influence but then again, he was largely right. 

What we learn is that past their sell-by-date, physicists, overconfident who backed the wrong horses (see Jastrow in 1978, banging on about another ice age) are still useful to those who would like to stop something happening. You borrow their prestige, you create the uncertainty and especially doubt in the public mind, and you just slow everything down. And that’s what happened here. 

What happened next. Team Fuckwit won the crucial battles in 1991/1992. Targets and timetables were excluded from the UNFCCC text. And Team Fuckwit kept winning battles and made a lot of money for rich people who wanted to stay rich or get richer. And there you have it. 

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: 

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

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

Categories
United States of America

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

Fifty-four years ago, on this day, February 16th, 1970, readers of Sports Illustrated write in to say “thanks” for the reprint of Ritchie Calder’s “Mortgaging the Old Homestead” article.

https://vault.si.com/vault/1970/02/16/19th-hole-the-readers-take-over

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 Ritchie Calder’s “Mortgaging the Old Homestead” had been syndicated in various places, including the Australian Bulletin. He was a well-respected and well-connected thinker, and it was an elegant summation of the predicament.

What we learn here is that Ritchie-Calder’s “Mortgaging the Old Homestead,” originally published in Foreign Affairs was popping up in all sorts of places; the Bulletin Sports Illustrated, and people were paying attention. People knew that we were in deep shit.  

What happened next? Everyone stayed concerned for a couple of years. But you can’t sustain that in the absence of effective social movements. And so it petered out and went away. 

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: 

Feb 16, 2005- The Kyoto Protocol shambles into futile existence, despite Uncle Sam’s best efforts

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

Categories
United States of America

January 28, 1969 – Santa Barbara Oil spill

Fifty five years ago, on this day, January 28, 1969.

“Oil from an offshore rig had covered the Santa Barbara beaches, trapping and killing the shore birds. College students and other young people had been enlisted to try to save the birds, by hand, one at a time. So night after night, television carried pictures of crying young people with dying birds in their arms. The networks picked this up… and across the continent environmental pollution came to be viewed as a highly personal, deeply involving part of people’s lives. The television viewers identified with the young volunteers and felt their pain.” (Sachsman, 2000)

1969 Blow out leading to Santa Barbara Oil Spill http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1969_Santa_Barbara_oil_spill

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 offshore oil drilling had been underway off the Santa Barbara coast for a number of years. There had been rising concerns about environmental pollution starting first in the cities and the air quality but also a river had caught fire or was to later in the same year, but it really caught fire before and generally a sense of fear about the consequences of industry.

What we learn – the Santa Barbara oil spill happening in a rich place managed to act as a kind of lightning rod for all of this stuff. It’s really the starting pistol for a lot. And it jolts people into awareness of the costs attached. The fact that it happened to rich people who were powerless to overcome the bureaucracy is kind of entertaining. So there’s some rather useful chapters in Wholly Round. There’s also “GOO” “get oil out”, which is akin to “Just Stop Oil.” And a sense that things were going tits up. 

What happened next? There’s a three year flurry of concern. Earth Day happens in April of 1970. And then it kind of peters out by ‘72, after the Stockholm conference. You start to get other issues impinging especially stagflation economic crisis, the oil shock, etc. 

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

SEE ALSO HARVEY MOLOTCH 1970 AND Raina Galaitas “Wholly Round” book
And Gordon MacDonald about The Environment

Also on this day: 

January 28, 2013 – Doomed “Green Deal” home insulation scheme launched in the UK

January 28, 1993 – Parliament protest – “Wake Up, the World is Dying” – Guest Post by Hugh Warwick

Categories
United Kingdom United States of America

January 26, 1970 – British PM offers US a “new special relationship” on pollution. (Conservative then tries to outflank him.)

Fifty four years ago, on this day, January 26th 1970 Harold Wilson held out a green olive branch…. As per the Tory MP Christopher Chataway, speaking in the House of Commons on 3 Feb 1970.

In New York on Monday [26 January 1970] of last week, the Prime Minister said:

“The British people today offer you, the American people, a new special relationship.”

As the Prime Minister went on, a no doubt grateful American people learned that the new special relationship was to help them with, among other things, the problems of pollution; in his words, “the problems of pollution of the air we breathe”. I have no evidence whether or not the great majority of Americans were over-impressed by this offer of the Prime Minister, but they would surely have been less impressed had he mentioned that the highly successful clean air policy which his Government had inherited was even then being brought to a grinding halt.

https://hansard.parliament.uk/Commons/1970-02-03/debates/fd90bff8-118d-4988-b0a2-074afcdfdf88/SmokelessZonesAndPollution?highlight=%22alkali%20inspectorate%22#contribution-0e5f6776-1edd-4f82-b06f-c094e863e036

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 both major political parties, Conservative and Labour had discovered the environment issue. In 1969, Wilson had used the word environment in his speech to Labour Party Congress, in Blackpool in September of ‘69, and had set up a Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution, and a white paper. 

Chataway was a then rising star, he’d been an athlete and a television presenter, and he was landing blows against Wilson. 

What we learn is that by 1970, there was a competitive consensus. The parties were competing to gain kudos for their green credentials. 

What happened next, Wilson lost the June 1970 election. A Department of Environment was still set up as a super Department under Peter Walker. And onward the caravan went to the Stockholm Environment conference. 

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: 

January 27, 1989 – UN General Assembly starts talking #climate

January 27, 1986 – Engineers try to stop NASA launching the (doomed) Challenger Space Shuttle

Categories
United States of America

January 26, 1958 – “Mystery of the Warming World” in Washington Star

Sixty six years ago, on this day, January 26th, 1958,

At the same time NAS was channelling Revelle, Edward Teller, father of the hydrogen bomb and an avid advocate for building hundreds of nuclear power plants, warned at the December 1957 meeting of the American Chemical Society that increasing CO2 might someday melt the polar icecaps and flood the world’s coastal regions.

Teller’s remarks and Revelle’s testimony to a congressional committee sparked a Washington Sunday Star article by Phil Yeager and John Stark in January 1958: “Mystery of the Warming World.” It was published on page 26 and included the prediction that CO2 warming of the climate might generate” a type of control regulation, law, interstate compact, and international agreement which could scarcely help clashing with some of our cherished notions of free enterprise. Industry, which might blossom in some directions … would be hamstrung in others. … Further, in view of the global nature of the problem, ordinary international agreements might prove inadequate for effective regulation.” International controls backed up by penalties, the prescient pair wrote, would be “sure to foster great heat and controversy.”

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2008/01/14/436446/-Blast-from-the-Past-8211-James-Hansen-1988

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 315ppm. As of 2024 it is 422ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context is that people had been talking about the greenhouse issue. And including Edward Teller. And two journalists had used it as the opening topic in a series of science articles.

 What we learn – we knew. We really knew. 

What happened next The issue kind of went away in 1959-60, and only started to seriously come back in the late 1960s. And I think it’s just too big for people to understand. And it’s still too big for them to understand the idea that we could have a global impact. I mean, it’s just bizarre. 

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: 

January 26, 1970 – US science bureaucrat writes “what’s going on?” memo about #climate

January 26, 1978: “West Antarctic ice sheet and C02 greenhouse effect: a threat of disaster” article in Nature…

Categories
Activism United States of America

January 16, 1919 – banning things that people like turns out not to work

One hundred and five years ago, on this day, January 16th 1919, a social movement got what it wanted. Utopia did not ensue.

The United States ratified the Eighteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, authorizing Prohibition in the United States one year after ratification. 

Legislation versus habit… ends badly… Baptists and bootleggers blah blah

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 303ppm. As of 2024 it is 422ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that Temperance groups had been pushing for decades for a law banning booze. And they’d gotten their way. And of course, this meant an explosion of organised crime because people still wanted to drink. And health implications from bathtub gin, the bootleggers’ violence, you name it. So not everything that a popular – or at least powerful – social movement wants and pushes through the legislature is automatically good or democratic, who knew? 

What we learn is that there is such a thing as “Baptists and bootleggers,” there can be an unholy symbiosis between religious zealots and banning things to create black markets. Yes, that is a right-wing talking point against climate legislation. 

I suppose the other thing we learned is that banning stuff can feel good. And certainly with the case of fossil fuels, you really need to push the alternatives hard and stop the people trying to stop you. Am I making any sense? 

What happened next. Prohibition lasted for 14 years, gave us organised crime, gun battles, gangsters, you name it. And then one of the first things that Franklin Roosevelt did, upon taking office, was to abolish it and everyone could get legally drunk again. What an extraordinary episode in human history, one that I haven’t thought about enough. 

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: 

January 16, 1995: There’s power in a (corporate) union #auspol

January 16, 2003 – Chicago Climate Exchange names founding members

Categories
United States of America

January 15, 1981 – US calls for effort to combat global environmental problems

Forty-three years ago, on this day, January 15th 1981, as the Reagan gang were about to take over, there was a plaintive plea…

Shabecoff, Philip. “U.S. Calls for Efforts To Combat Global Environmental Problems.” New York Times, January 15, 1981.

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 340ppm. As of 2024 it is 422ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context 

This is the last throw of the dice for the Council on Environmental Quality under Jimmy Carter. It had done some good stuff. The CEQ staffer Gus Speth had spent the last four years trying to push climate up the agenda. There had also been the Global 2000 report, which was produced by a separate body. Carter had lost the November 1980 election to Reagan who literally does not give a damn about conserving anything but is keen for ever greater exploitation.

What we can learn from this is that we knew what needed to be done. And we kept electing people who didn’t want to do it because they appealed to our ego, or our greed or something. 

What happened next? Reagan came in and shat all over climate action, environment action. See James Watt, etc, etc. And the emissions kept climbing and it was 1988 before presidential candidates were forced to speak about it. (There’s a more interesting story of Republican senators like John Chafee and so forth, actually understanding what was at stake in the mid-80s.) And the journo who wrote this story, Shabecoff? He also wrote the June 24th 1988 story on Hansen.

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: 

Jan 15, 1971 – greenwash before it was called greenwash #propaganda

January 15, 1990 – A political lunch with enormous #climate consequences for Australia #PathDependency #Denial  

Categories
United States of America

January 14, 1962 – As much truth as one can bear, James Baldwin

Sixty two years ago, on this day, January 14th 1962, American thinker and writer James Baldwin delivers a crucial bit of wisdom –  “Not everything that can be faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced” – in a New York Times opinion piece.

AS MUCH TRUTH AS ONE CAN BEAR: To Speak Out About the World as It Is, New York Times Jan 14, 1962 

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 318ppm. As of 2024 it is 422ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that James Baldwin had fled the United States to France, simply to stay alive. Being a queer, smart black man well, you were in a “bummer of a birthmark Hal” situation, weren’t you? But he’d obviously stayed in touch with what was happening. And my god, he was a brilliant essayist, and thinker. And the reason I’m citing this is that it contains the apparently first use of his crucial phrase, “not everything that can be faced, can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced.”

What we can learn is that there are smart people all around and we ought to pay more attention to them and to their ideas.

What happened next. Baldwin was heavily involved in advocating for civil rights. There is a movie that you simply must see. called I am not your Negro. Baldwin died in 1987.

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: 

Jan 14, 1972 – “A Blueprint for Survival” hits the headlines

January 14, 2010 – Investors hold UN summit on #climate risk

Categories
United States of America

January 11, 1970 – A new Ice Age on its way?

Fifty four years ago, on this day, January 11th, 1970, The Washington Post ran a story extrapolating from the previous decades and… well,

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 nobody was quite sure what the implications of industrialization might be. Yes, carbon dioxide would build up. But also dust and sulphur. And they had been reducing temperatures globally, or at least in the northern hemisphere for good 20 years. What if that process were to continue? Would it be possible to tip the incredibly complex, but possibly fragile and labile atmospheric system into a new ice age? We can look back now with hollow/grim laughter, but in 1969 1970, it wasn’t quite so clear cut. 

What we can learn from this is that people were having these debates and the Washington Post and others were covering them. 

What happened next? Well, although the Ice Age schtick continued for a few years, by the late 70s, it was pretty clear to everyone with the possible exception of Robert Jastrow that we were heading for warmer times (see here, in 1978). 

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

Peterson et al. 2008. The myth of the global cooling consensus. BAMS Vol 89, 9.

Also on this day: 

Jan 11, 1964 -: The Merchants of Doubt have work to do

January 11, 2010 – Bad news study about trees and the warming Arctic…