Sixteen years ago, on this day, November 19th, 2009,
‘If we are to tackle climate change in the years after Copenhagen, it is clear we will need to secure change of an unprecedented scale. The change needs to be very big…. In the United Kingdom we have pledged in law to cut our emissions by 80 per cent. That means we need our electricity and transport systems and homes to be near zero carbon. So we need a dramatic increase in renewable energy – we are planning for a six-fold increase by 2020.’
Ralph Miliband Lecture, 19 November 2009,
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 387ppm. 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 was that the British state had started making all the right noises about climate change from about 2005 (Gleneagles declarations etc etc). There had been the bipartisan “Climate Change Act” of 2008.
The specific context was – Ed was about to go off to Copenhagen, where we were all going to save the world.
What I think we can learn from this – what was that Hamlet said? “Words words words”.
And the success stories, like offshore wind? They happen by accident. Then, the stuff that might reduce energy emissions, i.e. free solar, that happens because Chinese manufacturing capacity is overbuilt. Oh, the ironies.
What happened next- Copenhagen failed. Ed beat his brother David to the leadership of the Labour Party, by the narrowest of margins. Ed then lost the 2015 election, but is now Starmer’s energy guy. Points for tenacity, I guess.
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.
Who are you – where did you grow up, what contact did you have with ‘nature’? (There’s good evidence to suggest that the main determinant of people getting properly switched on to environmental issues is unstructured play with minimal supervision in nature before age 11)
Hello! I’m Marianna Dudley, I’m an environmental historian. I started life in Brazil, spent some early years in Sweden, did most of my growing up in Cornwall, and now live in Bristol. I had a lot of contact with nature as a child: my uncle and aunt had a farm, and I spent a lot of time there watching lambs being born, running around the yard, annoying the sheepdogs, and poking around the pond. If not there, we’d be at the beach. Cornish beaches are unbeatable and I’m definitely happiest bobbing in the Atlantic just offshore of one.
2) A little about your academic background – undergrad what where why, ditto for masters and PhD
Like many History undergraduates, I opted for History because it was infinitely interesting and I didn’t have a career plan. I went to Warwick, because the department had a great reputation and I liked its image as an egalitarian, modern university (unaware at that point that EP Thompson had long ago seen the direction of travel to Warwick University Limited!); in my final year I happened to attend a guest lecture by David Nye, the American historian of energy, technology, and environment. It proved pivotal, introducing me to environmental history, which connected my love of nature and my academic interests. I looked for where I could study it further, which led me to Professor Peter Coates at the University of Bristol. During my Masters, Peter and Tim Cole received funding for a project researching Militarized Landscapes. I joined as PhD student, with Peter and Tim as my supervisors, and Chris Pearson (now at Liverpool) as postdoc showing me the ropes. It was a dream team! I loved the research and writing, and published my PhD thesis as a book shortly after I finished – An Environmental History of the UK Defence Estate, 1945 to the present.
3) In a nutshell (sorry!) what does your book argue, and where did it “come from” – what gaps in the previous understandings was it filling, what ‘myths’ is it overthrowing, or at the least complicating?
Electric Wind: An Energy History of Britain is the first academic history of British wind power, so it fills a substantial gap. It argues that the history of wind energy goes back much further than the modern wind farm, and is more diverse than you might expect. Wind energy has developed alongside, not counter to, other energy systems such as coal, oil, gas, and nuclear, and this has important implications today as we plan for a decarbonised energy system. It also argues that wind energy’s development has been contingent on national and international politics; and that particular ideas and ideologies shaped state and industry involvement. I want the book to show that attention to energy history can enliven current discussions of eg. net zero, which can be repetitive and fail to explore the potential to rethink energy systems along more equitable lines. I also hope it stands as a contribution to modern British history, as it argues that the rise of wind energy is a history of the nation as understood politically, socially, culturally and environmentally. These elements are just as important as the technology, so I am keen to ‘complicate’ top-down technocratic accounts!
4) What were your favourite and least favourite bits of the process? (Are you, like me, an archive monkey?)
I loved the research process for this book, partly because I thought about it for a long time in terms of an energy journey around Britain. It took me to some fascinating places. Like most historians, I love visiting archives, particularly local/regional archives – which I used a lot for this research. But I’m a true environmental historian in that I love field work too – pairing the document record with the landscape, reading the history and getting to know the place as two dimensions of the same inquiry. These are the two sides of historical research for me – the archive and the field. I loved exploring Orkney and the Outer Hebrides in this way for the book; I have a strong memory of driving around Lewis and Harris in a tiny hire car, stopping for roadside scallop baps (!) and swims at perfect sandy beaches en route to interviews with energy activists.
As for my least favourite bits of the process? It was frustrating at times to realise how little industry interest there seemingly was in the history of wind energy. It is, and has always been, a relentlessly forward-looking sector, and I hope this book will show why wind energy’s past is not only worth exploring, but also incredibly useful for shaking up how we think about energy, how it’s produced and who it is for.
5) Who should read it (well, obviously, everyone should) and why? How would it help us make sense of our current and near future dilemmas/trilemmas/quadlemmas?
I wrote this book for anyone with an interest in nature, climate change, landscape, and infrastructure! I try throughout the book to connect global issues of energy and climate with energy as it is experienced on the ground and in everyday life. There can be debilitating overwhelm when it comes to climate action, so I want the stories of communities who effected real change throughout the book to offer narratives of hope and determination. I’d love to get the book on the radar of politicians and policy-makers as it shows how much sustained, socially-engaged policy can achieve – the achievements of the North of Scotland Hydro-Electric Board in the post-Second World War period are a brilliant example of progressive infrastructural planning with social good at its heart. I was excited when Labour announced the GB Energy plans, but so far it hasn’t lived up to the hype. Does anyone have Ed Miliband’s address? I’d like to send him a copy! Apparently it has already been recommended to the Parliamentary Knowledge Foundation library, so that’s a great start.
6) What next for you? What’s the next project?
Electric Wind was the work of many years of research, so I’m wary of jumping straight into the next big project. I’m continuing to think about energy, particularly its cultural dimensions; and am interested in unpicking the different threads which fed into the emergent green political movement in Britain in the 1970s. So we’ll see where that takes me!
7) Anything else you’d like to say?
Thanks for the opportunity to tell you more about the book. As well as writing about energy and environment, I spend a lot of my time teaching it. I direct the MA Environmental Humanities programme at the University of Bristol, and am constantly amazed by the breadth of interests and experience that our students bring to the classroom. Join us! https://www.bristol.ac.uk/study/postgraduate/taught/ma-environmental-humanities/
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 414ppm. 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 was that Boris Johnson had become Prime Minister in July 2019, prorogued parliament illegally and then won the General Election. After shaking hands enthusiastically with people at hospitals, he’d ended up briefly in an ICU. Johnson’s wife-beating father, Stanley, had been aware of the problem of carbon dioxide build-up from the late 1960s, as the Spectator’s environment correspondent
The specific context was that the UK was going to be hosting a COP (first time) and so there had to be SOMETHING to make it look like the green show was still on the road.
What I think we can learn from this is that there can be a nice round-numbered policy document, and some nice graphics, all produced by a department of state. That doesn’t mean it is a strategy, but academics have to pretend that it is.
What happened next – Johnson was undone by a) himself and b) a scandal people could understand. Sunak basically binned “the energy transition” and “Red Ed” is beavering away, but nobody really believes in any of this stuff, do they?
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.
”Eighteen years ago, on this day, November 18th, 2006,
COP 12/CMP 2 took place between November 6 and 17, 2006 in Nairobi, Kenya. At the meeting, BBC reporter Richard Black November 18 coined the phrase “climate tourists” to describe some delegates who attended “to see Africa, take snaps of the wildlife, the poor, dying African children and women”. Black also noted that due to delegates’ concerns over economic costs and possible losses of competitiveness, the majority of the discussions avoided any mention of reducing emissions. Black concluded that was a disconnect between the political process and the scientific imperative.[16]
And, to quote Pulp’s Common People “everybody hates a tourist”.
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 382ppm. 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 was that the COP process had always attracted protests (see this piece I wrote ten years ago) and “tourists”.
The specific context was that it had seemed dead in the water, with Kyoto ratification stalled between 2001 (when Cheney-Bush pulled out) and 2005 (when the Russians saved the day, in exchange for WTO membership), but now the show was back on the road.
What I think we can learn from this is that the whole thing is a jamboree, and of late has been taken over by the fossil fuel gang.
What happened next – at the following COP, in Bali, a “roadmap to Copenhagen” was agreed. Yeah, that went well…
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.
Seventeen years ago, on this day, November 17th, 2009 Manchester City Council Executive agrees to a “climate action” plan.
I could go on for hours about this, but you really don’t want me to. Suffice to say the following.
It’s all “kayfabe”, designed to burnish the credibility of Labour with international investors
The councillors are mostly thick
Those who enable the councillors and the council bureaucracy are lickspittles and/or spivs (this includes the academics, btw).
The civil society organisations and social “movement” organisations are either asleep or useless or – somehow – both.
That’s it, that’s the post.
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 387ppm. 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 was Manchester City Council had already had one bout of pretending to care about environmental issues, back in the early 1990s. In 2000 they signed up to the Nottingham Declaration.
The specific context was that there had been failed attempts in 2006 to develop a “climate strategy” and eventually they’d hired a London-based consultant for £50k to write a truly terrible report called “Call to Action”. This provoked citizens (and yes, I was one) to produce a “Call to Real Action” which briefly forced the policymaking process open.
What I think we can learn from this – nasty, lying, venal stupid, sclerotic neoliberal. Just some of the many words that can be used to describe the higher-ups in Manchester Labour Party. And the council bureaucracy too.. Also, really incompetent.
What happened next – the plan was never implemented. The emissions reductions that did happen were from the National Grid, for the most part. Nothing special about Manchester at all. In 2018 Manchester City Council made more bold promises. All broken now, of course.
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.
Sixteen years ago, on this day, November 17th, ,2009 email hack at the Climatic Research Unit of University of East Anglia.
“Early on the morning of November 17, Gavin Schmidt sat down at his computer and entered his password. It didn’t work. Strange, he thought. He tried a few other accounts and none of them worked, either. Now he was alarmed. As a leading climatologist with NASA’s Goddard Institute in Manhattan, he’d been hacked before. He was used to e-mails from people who disapproved of his work,
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 387ppm. 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 was that scientists doing “impact science” work on climate had been attacked, smeared and intimidated since 1989 (e.g. hatchet jobs on James Hansen). It had hit an early peak in 1994-5 when the IPCC’s second assessment report was underway. It had continued against Michael Mann for the “hockey stick”.
The specific context was the Copenhagen climate sumit was about to start – and those opposed to action were going to do absolutely anything they could to reduce the chances of progress (the chances were vanishingly low, btw).
What I think we can learn from this – we should see this attack as part of a longer trend.
What happened next – there were various investigations and it was deemed a “nothing burger” – except the denialists, obvs, cried ‘cover-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.
Fifty years ago, on this day, November 17th, 1975 Living with Climatic Change conference begins in Toronto.
In 1975 there was an important conference in Toronto entitled “Living with Climate Change”, sponsored by the Canadian Meteorological Society, the Mexican Geophysical Union, the American Meteorological Society and the Science Council of Canada. It was attended by leading persons in atmospheric sciences at the time from Mexico, the United States, and Canada, many of whom became familiar figures in climate change issues in subsequent years. I think that it is of interest, and provides important perspective to our work today to quote from the first sentence of the report of thirty-four years ago (McTaggart-Cowan and Beltzner, 1976):
“There is growing evidence that the world is entering a new climate regime. Both the rate of change of the climate and the amplitude of short-term climatic variations will be much more pronounced than in the recent past.”
And the last sentence of the preface reads:
“We hope that this discussion will be a significant impetus toward furthering our ability to live more securely and more contentedly with climate change.”
Could not this statement from 1975 apply equally well to our symposium in 2009?
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 331ppm. 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 was by the mid-1970s there had been a lot of freaky bits of weather/desertification/crop failures etc. Carbon dioxide was not the only culprit (see also dust, thermal pollution).
The specific context was the Canadians were alive to the problems, given their long long winters, and a bunch of decent scientists.
What I think we can learn from this – we worried for a long time. By the mid 1970s, the worries were coalescing around carbon dioxide…
What happened next – the Americans were publishing, there was a push for a World Climate Conference, which happened in 1979. That could/should have been the moment a serious political push started. Oh well…
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.
Sixty four years ago, on this day, November 17th, 1961, the Twilight Zone got ecological…
Nov 17 1961 – “The Midnight Sun” is episode 75 of the American television anthology series The Twilight Zone, first shown in November, 1961.
Opening narration
The word that Mrs. Bronson is unable to put into the hot, still, sodden air is ‘doomed,’ because the people you’ve just seen have been handed a death sentence. One month ago, the Earth suddenly changed its elliptical orbit and in doing so began to follow a path which gradually, moment by moment, day by day, took it closer to the Sun. And all of man’s little devices to stir up the air are now no longer luxuries—they happen to be pitiful and panicky keys to survival. The time is five minutes to twelve, midnight. There is no more darkness. The place is New York City and this is the eve of the end, because even at midnight it’s high noon, the hottest day in history, and you’re about to spend it in the Twilight Zone. Whether explicitly nuclear or otherwise, the apocalypse was never far away [in the Twilight Zone]. “The Midnight Sun” was telecast on the day the U.S. consolidated its drive for “push-button warfare” with the first successful launching of a Minuteman missile from an underground silo. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Midnight_Sun_(The_Twilight_Zone)
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 317ppm. 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 was that it was the early 1960s – fears of nuclear war, of war by weather modification etc was in the air (not gonna apologise). See this from LBJ, who by this time was Kennedy’s Vice-President.
What I think we can learn from this – science fiction tries to tackle this stuff. The best sci-fi is “good for thinking with.”
What happened next – the Cuban Missile Crisis etc. And the emissions, they 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.
Sixteen years ago, on this day, November 16th, 2009,
A recently-released report by the World Coal Institute (WCI) on how to finance the experimental Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) technology for power stations, reminded me of a cartoon from years ago by the Australian cartoonist, Patrick Cook. In the cartoon, a huge bloated budgie (parakeet) with the letters “BHP” emblazoned on its chest, was holding a gun to its own head while proclaiming to a cowering politician, “Hand over the loot or the budgie gets it.” (At the time, BHP — which owned iron ore mines and steel mills — was haggling for government support for its ailing steel operations).
Burton. B. 2009. The Coal Industry Wants Your Cash to Save Them. PR Watch, 16 November.
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 387ppm. 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 was that there had been a brief flurry of interest in CCS in 1989-1990, but then people had realised how much it would cost and moved on to other schemes. By 2000 the bandwagon was rolling again, not quickly, but rolling.
The specific context was 2009 is kind of peak-CCS, because the Global Financial Crisis then wrecked the EU’s proposed funding model for it.
What I think we can learn from this – the rich are not going to dip into their own pockets. They’re gonna use the state to do the R&D…
What happened next – CCS fell in a heap. Has since been propped up, a bit like “Weekend at Bernie’s”, frankly.
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 six years ago, on this day, November 15th, 1979, the FT reports
“West Germany is to set up a study which could have a serious impact on its future energy policies, which at present stress the central importance of coal. The investigation is into the effects of carbon dioxide on the atmosphere.”
Boyes, Roger, 1979. Germany Probes Fossil Fuel Effects. Financial Times, November 15, p. 2
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 336ppm. 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 was that the Germans had been worrying about carbon dioxide for a little while by now (Hermann Flohn’s influence, possibly?).
The specific context was by the mid-1970s meetings were being held at IIASA and elsewhere about the problem. German scientists, and some politicians, were on the case. The first World Climate Conference, hosted by the WMO, had taken place in February 1979 in Geneva. In June 1979 Helmut Schmidt gave an interview to Time magazine where he explicitly mentioned carbon dioxide build-up. The G7 meeting (in Tokyo) had namechecked the issue.
What I think we can learn from this – plenty of people knew. But what are you going to do if you run on coal and nukes?
What happened next – the emissions kept climbing, of course. At the G7 in Bonn in 1985, the climate issue got namechecked again.
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.
