Thirty one years ago, on this day, December 31st, 1994,
Rupert Myers president of AATSE on “Climate Change Science: Current Understanding and Uncertainties”
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 359ppm. 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 climate problem had become an issue at last in 1988. Between then and 1994 there had been the release of the IPCC’s First Assessment Report, the signing of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in 1992 and its ratification by enough nations (quite speedily) for it to become international law and for the first “Conference of the Parties” (COP) to be set up. It was due to meet in Berlin in March-April 1995.
The specific context was that there were still people knocking around wanting to emphasise the uncertainties in the “let’s not take action” direction (there are, as we have learnt to our cost, dangers of UNDERestimating impacts).
Also, there was a carbon tax proposal that was going to come to Keating’s Cabinet soon.
What I think we can learn from this – species be doomed.
What happened next – the emissions climbed, the atmospheric concentrations climbed, the temperatures climbed. Species be doomed.
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.
Further reading
Rupert Horace Myers 1921–2019 | Historical Records of Australian Science | ConnectSci
Also on this day:
December 31, 1997 – Government slags off Australian Conservation Foundation
December 31, 2012 – Murdoch employee throws predictable inaccurate shite at Greens…
December 31, 2022 – FT publishes letter about Thatcher and Just Stop Oil
December 31, 2022 – We Quit, says some group everyone has forgotten about