Thirty five years ago, on this day, August 22nd, 1991,
There would be little point in Australia’s taking unilateral action to reduce greenhouse gases, according to a government report.
International consensus and concerted international action were needed if the greenhouse effect were to be addressed effectively.
The Industry’ Commission report, published today, “Costs and benefits of reducing greenhouse gas emissions”, examines the impact on Australian industry of an international stabilisation of greenhouse gases at 1988 levels by the year 2000 and a 20 per cent reduction in those emissions by the year 2005.
Uhlmann, C. 1991. Australia can’t work alone on greenhouse. Canberra Times, 22 August, p12
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 355ppm. As of 2026, 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 Australian political elites had been warned repeatedly about carbon dioxide build up from the late 60s onwards, and had adopted a wait and see strategy at various points.
The specific context was that in October 1990, in exchange for acceding to Australia, announcing a very hedged interim planning target around the Toronto proposal for a reduction in CO2 emissions of 20% by 2005 Treasurer, then-Treasurer Paul Keating had gotten the promise that the Industry Commission – a quasi-independent gang of growth-oriented intellectual thugs – would look at the greenhouse issue in the context of Australia’s economic performance.
By the time of the industry commission’s report coming out, Keating had quit government because Bob Hawke had reneged on a promise to step down in favour of Keating after the 1990 election, and was lurking on the back benches, biding his time. Graham Richardson, who had been Environment Minister, and then was butt hurt when he didn’t get the defence job he wanted was Keating’s leadership organiser (66 to 44 and “it’s enough”).
The Industry Commission report said the predictable things, and was a useful stick to beat advocates of action with because it was ostensibly independent and we were told that action was unnecessary and would be expensive blah blah blah – the usual.
What I think we can learn from this is that there is always one of these “don’t panic, no one needs to upset the applecart” reports coming out. Some work, some don’t.
What happened next Keating succeeded in toppling. Hawke in December 1991 and then Keating basically set fire to everything environmental that Hawke had proposed, including climate actions and Keating, in order to cover his ass, allowed waste minimization and recycling to stand in for actual policy.
On this topic, you might like these other posts on All Our Yesterdays
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You can see the chronological list of All Our Yesterdays “on this day” posts here.
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.
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Also on this day:
August 22, 1960 – JFK says “we must climb to the hilltop”
August 22, 1981 – New York Times front page story costs #climate scientists their jobs.
August 22, 1987 – “Civilisation and Rapid Climate Change” – a short book…
August 22, 1988 – scientists say “Australia, expect #climate refugees”
August 22, 2000 – Minchin kills an Australian Emissions Trading Scheme