Tag: Paul Tsongas

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Australia

April 16, 1980 – Melbourne Age reports “world ecology endangered”

Forty three years ago, on this day, April 16, 1980, the Melbourne Age ran an article based on comments by US scientist William Kellogg and others at a US Senate energy and natural resources committee hearing the day before. 

“The world could face an ecological disaster unless the amount of carbon dioxide pumped into the atmosphere is controlled.”

It is a stone cold classic of the “we were warned earlier than you think” genre. It is based on a congressional hearing, led by a clued-up Democrat, Paul Tsongas. Many familiar names are there (including some less familiar ones).  And the warnings are entirely prescient.

And here we are.

Anon. 1980. World Ecology is endangered. The Age, April 16, p.9.

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 340.9ppm. As of 2023 it is 420ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was

The big scientific push from the mid-1970s, in the aftermath of the 1972 Stockholm Conference, had left the scientists pretty clear on what was coming down the line. Their big challenge was to get politicians to see it.  Some (Tsongas, George Brown et al.) did…

What I think we can learn from this

The same dynamic has been playing out for ages – library shelves grown under the weight of books about the Science-Politics “interface”, with bromides about what is to be done…

What happened next

Work was already underway in Australia for an Australian Academy of Science conference about the topic.  Graeme Pearman and others (Barrie Pittock) were beavering away.

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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Ignored Warnings United States of America

April 7, 1980 – C02 problem is most important issue…”another decade will slip by” warns Wally Broecker to Senator Tsongas

On this day in 1980, the climate scientist Wally Broecker, the father of oceanography wrote to Democratic senator and future presidential hopeful Senator Paul TsongasPaul Tsongas. 

As historian Spencer Weart,( AIP.org:) “In 1980, the prominent geophysicist Wallace Broecker, who had spoken out repeatedly about the dangers of climate change, vented his frustration in a letter to a Senator. Declaring that ‘the CO2 problem is the single most important and the single most complex environmental issue facing the world,’ and that ‘the clock is ticking away,’ Broecker insisted that a better research program was needed. ‘Otherwise, another decade will slip by, and we will find that we can do little better than repeat the rather wishy washy image we now have as to what our planet will be like…'”

– Broecker to Sen. Paul Tsongas, 7 April 1980, “CO2 history” file, office files of Wallace Broecker, LDEO.

Why this matters. 

Scientists have been trying to get policymakers concerned about climate change for a very long time. Broker, as we saw earlier, had also engaged with Exxon.

This sort of lobbying is part of the effort to get elite policymakers sensitised to what’s going on and this is part of what Hart and Victor write about in their wonderful 1993 article.

What happened next?

Broecker kept trying to warn humanity, which kept ignoring him. Tsongas stood for President in ’92, but lost the nomination to Bill Clinton and died not long after of cancer

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Ignored Warnings United States of America

April 3, 1980 – US news anchorman Walter Cronkite on the greenhouse effect

On this day, third of April 1980, CBS News, anchored by Walter Cronkite had a two and a half minute story on climate change (by reporter Nelson Benton), hooked on some Senate hearings on the subject. 

Cronkite was a vastly respected news anchor. And famously, President Lyndon Johnson had said to Robert McNamara, “if we’ve lost Cronkite, we’ve lost the war.” 

Long before 1980, Cronkite already done stuff about the natural world – he threw CBS’s considerable weight behind “Earth Day” in 1970 – see this fascinating piece  

The Senate hearings were the work of people like X, Y, and they included a young Al Gore. 

“The CBS Evening News for April 3, 1980 carried a two minute 40 second story by Nelson Benton on the greenhouse effect based on a Senate Energy & Natural Resources committee hearing.

Why this matters. 

We need to remember that people, elites and everyone knew about this issue as early as 1980 in public and it was getting news coverage. For the love of Gaia, the problem is not information, the problem is sustaining attention, political and cultural pressure. That doesn’t come from ever more clever messaging, it comes from effective social movements and real democracy. But that is beyond our grasp now… But I digress…

What happened next?

Cronkite kept doing stuff he’d already done stuff about the natural world. And Gore famously kept hold of the issue and after the Villach meeting in 1985. Senators Republican, Democrat and Republican, stepped up the pressure. And that period between 93 That’s right. 85 and 88 is fascinating.