Tag: 1996

Categories
Carbon Capture and Storage Norway

September 15, 1996 – A CCS posterchild is born: Sleipner Field comes online.

Twenty eight years ago, on this day, September 15th, 1996, a crucial part of the CCS publicity campaign came into existence.

The Sleipner Vest (West) field is used as a facility for carbon capture and storage (CCS).[1][8][9] It is the world’s first offshore CCS plant, operative since September 15, 1996.[10][11] The project, in the initial year, proved insecure due to sinking top sand.[10] However, after a re-perforation and an installation of a gravel layer in August 1997, CCS operations were secure.[10] As of 2018, one million tonnes of CO2 have been transported and injected into the formation yearly since 1996.

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 363ppm. As of 2024 it is 422ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that in 1991, the Norwegian government had passed a carbon tax. And this gave an incentive for the state owned oil company, Statoil, (the clue is in the name) to set up injection of CO2 into a depleted North Sea oil and gas field known as Sleipner. Also, the oil and gas they were extracting had high CO2 anyway, so they were going to need to ‘sweeten’ it anyway.

And this is really the poster child for CCS alleged as a proof of concept and is still being trotted out as “CCS works” almost 30 years later.

What we learn is that government policy can drive innovation and corporate behaviour if it’s well-designed with few loopholes, one or two incentives, etc. And it’s within the corporate skill set and their imaginations and so, it came to pass.

What happened next. Sleipner Field kept getting used as the poster child for CCS for the next 30 years because there are precious few other actually successful projects that bear much scrutiny: looking at Kemper, looking at you Boundary Dam, looking at you Gorgon. 

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: 

September 15, 1948 – Biologist Evelyn Hutchinson mentions carbon dioxide build-up at an AAAS symposium.

September 15, 1980 – Australian scientists hold “Carbon Dioxide and Climate” symposium in Canberra

September 15, 1982/1990 – “Environmental Justice” is born. And so is Captain Planet…

September 15, 2008- business splits over what to extort from Rudd…

Categories
Australia International processes Sweden UNFCCC

: July 18, 1996 – Australian Prime Minister snubs #climate talks

Twenty eight years ago, on this day, July 18th, 1996, John Howard showed his priorities…

Its Ministerial Declaration was noted (but not adopted) July 18, 1996, and reflected a U.S. position statement presented by Timothy Wirth, former Under Secretary for Global Affairs for the U.S. State Department at that meeting, which:

1. Accepted the scientific findings on climate change proffered by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in its second assessment (1995);

2. Rejected uniform “harmonized policies” in favor of flexibility;

3. Called for “legally binding mid-term targets”.

AND

“PRIME Minister John Howard yesterday [18th] snubbed the international community, claiming Australia would continue to oppose reductions in greenhouse gases.

“Australia has drawn international condemnation for its refusal to accept legally binding reductions in greenhouse gases now accepted as causing global warming.”

Benson, S. 1996. Howard snubs world / Greenhouse gas call `hurts Australia’. Daily Telegraph, July 19, p.14.

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 362ppm. As of 2024 it is 426ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that John Howard had come to power in March of that year and took the Keating government’s antipathy to all things climate, and dialled it up from a solid eight or nine to an 11. “This one goes up to 11”. 

What we learn is that the Australian political elite was extremely hostile to anything that would get between them and profits. For coal companies, they could see no other way of being in the world. And they didn’t see the need for that other way, because they didn’t accept 19th century physics {LINK}

What we learn is that we’ve already learned that John Howard is a contemptible climate criminal.

What happened next, Howard dialled up the ante – the international agreement campaign against Australia having to cut emissions was not an 11 but a 12. The following year, he sent diplomats all around the world to try to carve out a special deal for Australia and was spectacularly successful in doing so. 

And here we are almost 30 years later; acts of cosmic vandalism. And you need a heart of stone not to despair. 

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: 

July 18, 1979 – US Senators ask for synthetic fuel implications for greenhouse warming. Told.

July 18, 2005 – inconvenient energy targets scrapped

July 18, 2012: Climate Justice poem – “Tell Them” by Kathy Jetnil-Kijiner – hits the internet

Categories
Australia International processes Swtizerland

July 12, 1996 – medics slam energy companies for outright denial and obstruction

Twenty eight years ago, on this day, July 12th, 1996, COP2 

GENEVA, July 12 (Reuter) – Top specialists on the effects of global warming on human health on Friday accused energy corporations of working to undermine international efforts to halt climate change.

The attack came amid growing controversy at a two-week United Nations conference on how far to limit “greenhouse gas” emissions, mainly from burning of oil and coal, blamed by key scientists for rising world temperatures.

“The fossil fuel lobby is beginning to behave like the tobacco industry did 30 years ago, as adverse health effects of smoking first emerged,” Anthony McMichael of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine said.

“It is using a typical rearguard action, through attempts at distortion, delaying tactics and making enough noise to drown out the arguments for strong moves by the world’s political leaders to cut emissions,” he told a news conference.

1996 – Evans, R. 1996 Doctors hit energy groups over global warming. Reuters News 12th July

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 363ppm. As of 2024 it is 426ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that COP1 had finished with the so-called Berlin Mandate, which meant rich nations were going to have to come to Kyoto with an agreement to reduce their emissions. The new federal government in Australia was distinctly unimpressed. And so was industry, which had seen off a domestic carbon tax and had it replaced with a meaningless Greenhouse Challenge probably saw no reason why that same victory couldn’t be repeated on the international stage. Yes, you’d have to ignore brown people living in low lying countries and islands. But that was hardly difficult. 

What we learn is that fossil fuel interests had had successes domestically, and had every confidence that they could repeat that internationally. And it turns out, sadly, for our species, and all the other species on this beautiful planet, that their confidence was well-founded. They managed to gut the ambition and the Kyoto Protocol. And they’ve managed to keep winning. Now, they were joined in this by inertia, complacency, neoliberalism, whatever set of explanations, nouns you want to use. But they were a key factor in making sure nothing significant got done. And they were very, very good at doing that.

What happened next? Australia carved out an incredibly generous deal at Kyoto in 1997. And then, still refused to ratify. When they finally did in 2007 it was a meaningless gesture. The sort of thing that Kevin Rudd excelled at. Actually doing policy and implementation, he found somewhat more challenging.

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: 

July 12, 1953 – “The Weather is Really Changing” says New York Times

July 12, 1978 – US Climate Research Board meeting

July 12, 2007 – #Australia gets swindled on #climate change…

Categories
Australia

July 10, 1996 – National Greenhouse Advisory Panel cops a serve

Twenty eight years ago, on this day, July 10th, 1996, the Sydney Morning Herald ran a story about the NGAP report, saying it had ignored the tricky issue of climate change.

The day before, the Australian had had this –

FUEL and power subsidies, poor planning and political inaction have slowed Australia’s drive to cut its greenhouse emissions, a government advisory panel has warned.

The National Greenhouse Advisory Panel, representing industry, conservation, science and community sectors, has advised the Federal and State governments to consider imposing firm targets for greenhouse reductions in the manufacturing, agriculture, transport and household sectors.

It has urged governments to start planning for the effects of higher temperatures and rising sea levels caused by global warming next century.

NGAP’s chairman, Professor Paul Greenfield of the University of Queensland, yesterday said the panel’s two-year review of Australia’s official greenhouse policy had identified “shortfalls”. “There needs to be a bit of revitalisation in the response,” he told The Australian, on the eve of United Nations negotiations in Geneva for a new climate change treaty.

“I think it has slowed down a bit. It’s not that it’s all been totally a disaster, but it’s fair to say not a lot has happened.”

Statistics due to be released today show that Australia’s greenhouse emissions rose 3 per cent last year – in breach of an international target to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide to 1990 levels by 2000.

Bita, N. 1996. Subsidies slow greenhouse drive. The Australian, 9 July, p.2. 

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 362ppm. As of 2024 it is 426ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that the NGAP was set up in June 1994, when Labor Environment Minister John Faulkner was trying to show he ‘got it’ and gave a damn. The Howard Government had come in, in March, and had taken a chainsaw with it to COP-2 in Switzerland and the National Greenhouse Advisory Panel, which, to be fair, was merely advisory, not statutory and so could be (and was) easily ignored.

What we learn is that there’s a real risk to you if you get involved in these advisory panels that you’ll be used as a fig leaf and then presented with a choice of “shut up and be still be in the room with the big powerful people, but lose all credibility beyond” or “walk and be accused of spitting the dummy and not understanding how politics is done,” when in actual fact you understand all too well; you have the brains but not the stomach for the lies and evasions and bullshit. 

What happened next? The National Greenhouse Advisory Panel was killed off a few years later and was not mourned or missed.

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: 

July 10, 1985 – French state commits terrorist act

July 10, 2008 – first Australian #Climate Camp begins, near Newcastle

July 10, 2010 – Rio Tinto amplifies the message…

Categories
Australia

April 19 1996 – Ark hits the world wide web..

Twenty eight years ago, on this day, April 19th, 1996, climate campaigners took to the web…,

Australian environmental education has been launched onto an international stage, with local group ARK Australia yesterday going live on the Internet with a World Wide Web site called Planet Ark.

The product of a significant cooperative effort involving the Seven Network , Austereo, Reuters and Sanitarium, the site will provide on-demand 24-hour environmental radio news on the Net, along with environmental software and celebrity campaigns that can be downloaded free of charge, including the “Save the Planet” videos featuring stars such as Pierce Brosnan, Dustin Hoffman, Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman.

Helen Meredith. 1996. Planet Ark’s world-first on the Net. The Australian Financial Review, 19 April 1996 p48

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 362ppm. As of 2024 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that the World Wide Web and cyberspace were just arriving. And therefore it was newsworthy when someone set up a website. The deeper context is that the Australian outpost of Ark seemed to have taken some sort of hold, though it had sunk in the UK.

What we learn is that celebrities have always been yammering about environmental issues, but are also often celebrities that are spectacularly badly placed. Because pretty much by definition, their lifestyles are high carbon, and they can be accused of being hypocrites, so out of touch, e.g. “Carbon Cate” in 2011… 

What happened next? The World Wide Web gave us a highly intelligent fact based public sphere. Now I’m just playing with you: look around you for a minute… 

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 19, 1973 – first film to mention global warming released (Soylent Green)

April 19, 1943 – the Warsaw Ghetto uprising began.

April 19, 2002 – Exxon got a top #climate scientist sacked.

Categories
Australia

July 25, 1996 – Australian PM John Howard as fossil-fuel puppet

Twenty seven years ago, on this day, July 25, 1996, then-new Prime Minister John Howard was correctly identified as a muppet. Sorry, puppet.

The Howard Government has refused to endorse Labor’s program to support research into renewable ethanol fuel, drawing sharp criticism from industry and the Australian Democrats.

At a meeting with ethanol industry representatives yesterday, the Minister for Resources and Energy, Senator Warwick Parer, refused to guarantee continuing commitment to a bounty scheme and a pilot plant which were funded by the former Labor Government to encourage cost-effective production of the alternative fuel.

Martin, C. 1996. Howard a ‘fossil fuel puppet’, Australian Financial Review, 26 July, p. 16.

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 363.7ppm. As of 2023 it is 423ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that John Howard has not been Australian Prime Minister long (March of 1996). But it’s pretty obvious that whatever lingering hopes, environmentalists and producers of ”environmentally friendly fuel” ethanol were not going to get much love. And their low expectations were met.

What I think we can learn from this is that a new government whether it has a different ideology or a leader with different priorities can suddenly not be returning the calls of various actors, be they entrepreneurs or social movement organisations or whatever. And windows of opportunity, both for the social and technological innovations can close really rapidly. And of course, everyone knows that, which is why you get such desperation about any given election because opportunities for either necessary research and development or sucking on the public tit, (depending on your perspective) will be curtailed. And so it came to pass in this case. 

What happened next

Howard ruled Australia for 11 years. He did everything he could to squash renewables with some success. Well, certainly delay. 

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.

Categories
Science

July 4, 1996 – article in Nature saying ‘it’s partly us’

Twenty seven years ago, on this day, July 4, 1996, in an issue of Nature, 

“Benjamin Santer, K.E. Taylor, Tom M. Wigley, and ten other researchers published an article that concluded: “The observed spatial patterns of temperature change in the free atmosphere from 1963 to 1987…are similar to those predicted by state-of-the-art climate models… It is likely that this trend is partially due to human activities,…”

Gelbspan, R. (1998) Page 220

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 365ppm. As of 2023 it is 423ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that the IPCC second assessment report was coming out. And the authors of this article, especially Santer, had been attacked on spurious grounds repeatedly, publicly and viciously by demented [see addendum at foot of post] old men who were being funded by cynical fossil fuel interests. These assholes were at base, very well aware of the climate science, which was not really in dispute. 

What we learn again, there are no depths to which these mongrels, these monsters, will not stoop.

What happened next

Santer’s career continued. The science kept getting stronger. The Global Climate Coalition was able to fold in 2002 to having achieved its aims of stopping the US taking any serious climate action. 

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.

Addendum

A commenter has raised an eyebrow over the adjective demented, and they are 100% correct. It was simply wrong to throw a medical term around as an insult. It also medicalises and explains away a political decision. I will try to do better in future. If you, reader(s?) see other examples of dodgy thinking/language, feel free to drop me a line.

Categories
Denial IPCC

May 30, 1996 – Denialist goons smear scientist

Twenty seven years ago, on this day, May 30, 1996, Fred Seitz, energetic and lunatic denialist, tries to smear the IPCC, focussing on one particular scientist, Ben Santer

“This controversial issue also resulted in two letters (dated 30 May and 26 June), being sent to me, one from the Global Climate Coalition (John Schlaes) and the other from The Climate Council (Donald Pearlman). Copies of these were also sent to ten key members of the US Congress as well as the Advisor for Science and Technology and Assistant to the US President (John Gibson), and the Assistant Secretary of State (Eileen Clausen).”

Bolin 2007, page 130

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 365.3ppm. As of 2023 it is 420ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that the Global Climate Coalition was in full beast mode, trying to attack specifically Ben Santer. And as one of the authors of the lead authors of a particular chapter of the IPCC’s second assessment report (which said that there was evidence of a discernible impact of man’s activities on the climate). Almost 30 years later, it’s not really regarded as controversial. But this was the first statement of the IPCC to that effect. And the Global Climate Coalition was wanting to try to stop it or failing that, send a warning to other scientists. Let’s try and chill the debate or slow it down.

What I think we can learn from this

This is an age-honoured tactic, that you shoot messengers and hang the body on a gibbet with a sign that says “This is what happens if you open your big fucking mouth”. It was ever thus. And having it come from multiple sources, and be distributed to lots of people is also standard – makes a lot of noise, kicks up a lot of dust and dirt…

What happened next was that someone at the Wall Street Journal probably got a copy of that letter because a few days later, there was an editorial smearing Santer.

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.

See also –

Excerpt from Oreskes and Conway’s Merchants of Doubt https://billmoyers.com/2014/05/16/the-relentless-attack-of-climate-scientist-ben-santer/

Fred Pearce interview with Ben Santer, 2010…

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2010/feb/09/ipcc-report-author-data-openness

Categories
Denial

 February 2, 1996 – denialist sprays #climate science with his bullshit

Twenty seven years ago, on this day, February 2, 1996, denialist idiot Fred Singer wrote to the journal Science…

“Then Fred Singer launched an attack. In a letter to Science on February 2, 1996, four months before formal release of the Working Group 1 Report, Singer presented a litany of complaints.”

Oreskes and Conway, 2010 Page 205

and

In a letter to Science magazine (February 2, 1996) S. Fred Singer charged that the most recent IPCC assessment “presents selected facts and omits important information.”

Gelbspan, R. (1998)  Page 227

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 362ppm. As of 2023 it is 420ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was

The denialists – both those who were lying for money and those who were lying to themselves, also for money – were fighting a rearguard action against inconvenient reality. The second Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change synthesis report was being released. It said that there was already a discernible impact from human activities on the climate. This was anathema to the denialists, because it would then lead to pressure for real regulation. 

By now, of course, the Berlin mandate (agreed at COP1 in Berlin in 1995) was underway, meaning that rich nations were being compelled to negotiate an agreement on emissions cuts. 

What I think we can learn from this

In order to avoid outcomes they don’t like, denialists will attack scientists and smear them. This is more widely recognized now.. One form of these attacks is now known as the Serengeti Strategy, a term coined by Michael Mann, a climate scientist who would be attacked from 1998 for his “hockey stick”.

What happened next

The attacks on scientists continued and culminated in 2009, with the theft of emails from the UEA server. The selective release and cherry-picking of the emails were part of a largely successful effort to sow doubt and confusion in the minds of people who might otherwise have mattered, or who may have done things that mattered.

What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong?  Do comment on this post.

Categories
Australia Economics of mitigation

November 26, 1996 – Australian climate modelling is ridiculed

On this day, November 26, 1996  an Australian politician ripped into the “official” modelling on which Australian governments (BOTH LABOR AND LIBERAL) had relied to say “oh, no, can’t do anything that might reduce the acceleration of our coal mining and coal exporting, or else the sky will fall.”

Leader of the Democrats, Senator Cheryl Kernot stated in the Senate:

“Let us not forget who ABARE is. It is the ideological cousin of the Industry Commission and it never misses an opportunity to slip the boot into environmental or social causes, churning out statistics from its largely discredited macro-economic modelling, showing how much better off we would all be if only we mined more coal, produced more electricity and puffed more carbon dioxide every day. I am willing to bet that if ABARE existed 150 years ago, it would have produced a whopping great spreadsheet proving that the economy could not afford to ban child labour in the coal mines”

(Senate Hansard 26.11.96 p 6014).

On ABARE, see also  “High and Dry” by Guy Pearse and “Scorcher” by Clive Hamilton.

On economic forecasting – I recently learnt the brilliant John Kenneth Galbraith quote – ““The  only function of economic forecasting is to make astrology look respectable,”

[The amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere was 362ppm. At time of writing it was 417ishppm- but for what it is now,well, see here for the latest.]

The context was this – 

Australian governments were looking for excuses to do nothing to slow down the acceleration of Australian coal exports. ABARE helped to provide those excuses.

Why this matters. 

The way economic modelling is used to justify all sorts of horror (usually the continued enrichment of the already filthy rich, and/or the galloping desolation of our being-murdered planet), is a) by now very obvious and b) never-ending, despite a).

What happened next?

ABARE and its “MEGABARE” nonsense was thoroughly exposed and discredited(see here). Which did nothing to stop the Howard Government from continuing to use it.