Forty seven years ago, on this day, September 17th, 1978,
17 Sept 1978 Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That this Act may be cited as the “National Climate Program Act”
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 335ppm. 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 efforts, since about 1974 iirc, to beef up Federal support for/co-ordination of climate research (n.b. At this point carbon dioxide was only one of many different matters of concern).
The specific context was Various tenacious politicians kept on the case, despite repeated failures (George Brown etc).
What I think we can learn from this
Science requires funding and leadership. What happens when you have neither? Well, we’re finding out.
What happened next
By 1979 it was pretty clear to the smarter people in the room that the carbon dioxide build-up was the problem to watch. The politicians took a decade to convince.
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 17, 1954 – nuclear electricity will be too cheap to meter – All Our Yesterdays
September 17, 1969 – trying to spin Vietnam, Moynihan starts warning about #climate change
September 17, 1987 – report on “The Greenhouse Project” launch
September 17, 2002 – UK Government announces feasibility study into Carbon Capture and Storage