All Our Yesterdays

Dr Gethin Matthews of Swansea University writes a must-read guest post…

As everyone with a hint of scientific training knows by now, the world is facing a troublesome present and uncertain future due to the changes in the global climate caused by man-made activity, and specifically the greenhouse effect. It is an interesting – and important – question to ask what warnings were made by scientists over the past few decades. This brief investigation sheds some light by looking at the articles on climate change issues published in a Welsh-language scientific journal.

The Welsh scientific journal Y Gwyddonydd (‘The Scientist’) was launched in 1963, and its genesis reflects the challenges that faced the Welsh language at that time. The percentage recorded as speaking Welsh in the 1961 census had fallen to 26%, which acted as a spur to the campaign to secure official rights for the language and to increase its use in education. Establishing a journal to present scientific matters through the medium of Welsh was a statement that the language should be part of the modern world, and not ghettoised as a medium only suitable for literary, antiquarian or theological discussions.  

The journal sought to introduce current scientific developments and arguments to the Welsh-speaking audience and so it is a fair assumption that it was responsible for the first discussions in Welsh of topics that are now all too familiar. Thus in 1985 there are two sizeable articles investigating ‘glaw asid’ (acid rain), whereas the first reference to the ‘haenen osôn’ (ozone layer) can be found the following year.

The phrase ‘effaith tŷ gwydr’ (greenhouse effect) appears for the first time in Y Gwyddonydd in the edition of December 1972, in a report which considered the possible effects upon the climate from man-made pollution.

Would the increased level of CO₂ in the atmosphere due to human activity lead to a rise in the world’s temperature, or would the increased number of particles in the atmosphere reflect the sun’s rays back into space, leading to global cooling? At the time the answer was unclear, and the ‘effaith tŷ gwydr’ is referred to as a theory. One unknown variable to be thrown into the equation was the expected rise in supersonic aircraft, pouring SO₂ and water vapour into the upper atmosphere, the effect of which could not be predicted. 

It appears that the next treatment of this topic in Y Gwyddonydd was in December 1981, where John Gribbin’s recent article in the New Scientist was discussed.

He had postulated that the enhanced greenhouse effect due to the increase of CO₂ in the atmosphere would lead to a rise of 2 to 3 °C by 2025, according to the best available computer models. The report goes on to consider the effects of this upon the world’s food production, and hints at the geo-political turmoil that would follow. The conclusion is that time is against us.

The text of a speech by Eirwen Gwynn is printed in the next issue, in which she warns of the possible dire effect upon the climate of continuing to burn fossil fuels. (Interestingly, having been keen on nuclear power back in the first issue of Y Gwyddonydd back in 1963, by 1982 she declared that atomic energy was not the answer).

The next instance of a discussion of the greenhouse effect appears in late 1988, in an article which has in its title the phrase ‘Hinsawdd Newydd’ (‘A New Climate’) – the phrase used today, ‘Newid Hinsawdd’ (Climate Change) is not one that appears in the discussions at that time. The first evidence I have found of a break-through into the Welsh broadcast media happened at the same time, with a Radio Cymru programme focussing upon the ramifications of the greenhouse effect in November 1988.

In 1990, Y Gwyddonydd published an in-depth explanation of the phenomenon by a physicist from Aberystwyth University.

From then on there is a stream of articles in the journal considering the likely effects of global warming upon the planet, and which are explicit in their warning of the dangers.

In late 1991, for example, the headline of an article adapted the words from an ancient Welsh poem to warn ‘Truan o Dynged a Dyngwyd i Ddynoliaeth’ – ‘Wretched is the fate that will befall mankind’.

One can also find more Welsh-language radio and television programmes that seek to explain the dangers.

Thus the evidence here is unambiguous. In the Welsh public sphere, the dangers of global warming were understood and discussed by the early 1990s at the latest. The scientific predictions made were broadly accurate. As we approach 2025 we can see that the prediction made in 1981 of a rise of 2-3 °C was overly pessimistic, but that the disruption that even 1.5 °C will cause will be enormous. The warning was made about 42 years ago that time was running out to stop the catastrophe, and it was widely disseminated. The follow-up question of why warnings by scientists were not taken seriously by decision-makers is beyond the scope of this brief article, but is one that needs to be asked.  

Dr Gethin Matthewsis a senior lecturer in the Department of History, Heritage and Classics at Swansea University. His PhD research was in the history of the Welsh in the Gold Rushes, but for a decade and more he has been researching the impact of the First World War upon Wales. He is currently working on a book for the University of Wales Press, Visions of War, which will examine how WW1 was seen and imagined in Wales.When he manages to escape the trenches, he intends to investigate how climate change discourse has developed in Wales over the past sixty years.