Documents show industry-backed Air Pollution Foundation uncovered the severe harm climate change would wreak

The fossil fuel industry funded some of the world’s most foundational climate science as early as 1954, newly unearthed documents have shown, including the early research of Charles Keeling, famous for the so-called ‘Keeling curve’ that has charted the upward march of the Earth’s carbon dioxide levels.

A coalition of oil and car manufacturing interests provided $13,814 (about $158,000 in today’s money) in December 1954 to fund Keeling’s earliest work in measuring CO2 levels across the western US, the documents reveal.

Keeling would go on to establish the continuous measurement of global CO2 at the Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii. This ‘Keeling curve’ has tracked the steady increase of the atmospheric carbon that drives the climate crisis and has been hailed as one of the most important scientific works of modern times.

  • theodewere@kbin.social
    371·
    9 months ago

    there has never been any doubt about climate science, and anyone who suggested there was is a lying sack of shit

    • pearsaltchocolatebar@discuss.online
      5·
      9 months ago

      There was a period where we weren’t sure if it was a natural change or man made. It’s wasn’t a long period, but there was definitely initial doubt.

      • ForgotAboutDre@lemmy.world
        1·
        9 months ago

        When it was in the public debate, we knew it was man made. The fossil fuel industry did a lot of PR/propaganda to shift public opinion and push false narratives like we didn’t know. Despite these same companies being the first to collect data and models on the very thing they were denying.

  • gibmiser@lemmy.world
    10·
    9 months ago

    So it’s time for them to voluntarily cough up to fix the problem by coming to an industry agreement with national governments on what portion of assets of all companies involved must be contributed to efforts to fix the problem.

    Or else it’s time without them for governments to seize assets To be used to fix the problem through direct capture and mitigation effort And by funding jobs and industries that are Furthering green renewable safe energy and infrastructure.

    I’m not sure about the rest of the world, But America has an upward mobility crisis right now. I don’t care how many people who are Disgustingly rich become just a little bit rich in the process. Lifting up millions of americans and fixing our self-destructive infrastructure Is an obvious solution.

    • DessertStorms@kbin.social
      5·
      9 months ago

      You say all that as if the governments aren’t owned by and run for the disgustingly rich, which is why reform isn’t a solution (there is no legislating climate change away) but rather the whole system needs abolishing.

      • tim-clark@kbin.social
        11·
        9 months ago

        And one country can’t solve the issue. We all need to work together…which will never happen

        • underisk@lemmy.ml
          2·
          9 months ago

          I don’t think you’re gonna hurt anything by acting on climate change without a global consensus. I do think the effect COVID had on warming showed pretty clearly how much is possible when even a few countries just take indirect action.

  • winterayars@sh.itjust.works
    112·
    9 months ago

    In Go Nagai’s Devilman, climate change is an important plot point. That story was written in 1972. We’ve known.

        • sigmaklimgrindset@sopuli.xyz
          1·
          9 months ago

          True, Crybaby was a more experimental art piece than a faithful adaptation of the story.

          I still like it though, but for very different reasons than why I like the 90s OVA…and the weird live action…

  • YeetPics@mander.xyz
    6·
    9 months ago

    Let’s get the names of the c level execs for these companies from 1950-1990 and reference the 23&me biomap.

    What we do with the names and addresses of their offspring is not for me to decide, but if their lies led their offspring to wealth it would be quite fair to remove it before SHTF.

  • IninewCrow@lemmy.caEnglish
    4·
    9 months ago

    Lol … Smoking gun

    It’s like having someone shoot a comically oversized cannon with mostly coal and gasoline that would produce a big giant black cloud to shoot a tiny metal ball … and then everyone standing around asking where the shot was fired from.

  • doublejay1999@lemmy.world
    218·
    9 months ago

    So happy to sit back and gossip about “ooo the evil companies” but they do nothing to elect the people that could change things .

    Man fuck the Guardian and their charade

    • Coreidan@lemmy.worldEnglish
      83·
      9 months ago

      Like who? Who can I vote for that will make a difference? Give me a name

      Edit: ah no response. Shocker. Almost as if you only want to sling shit without anything useful to contribute.

      • alvvayson@lemmy.world
        3·
        9 months ago

        The real problem is that there is no one we can vote for that can make a difference.

        One half of the politicians want to continue using fossil fuels.

        And the other half wants to do mostly virtue signalling with policies that look good on paper, but won’t actually solve the problem.

        I guess the second group is less bad, but politics is unlikely to save the climate.

        Sorry, don’t have a solution. We could have solved it by continuing to deploy and develop nuclear after Chernobyl, but by now it seems like 2 or 3 degrees of warming is inevitable.

        • Coreidan@lemmy.worldEnglish
          1·
          9 months ago

          In other words our leadership is greedy and they only care about their own comfort at the expense of everyone else.

          They know they’ll die long before any of this affects them.

          They don’t give a fuck about their own grand children, which should tell you everything about what kind of people they are.

      • silence7@slrpnk.netM
        41·
        9 months ago

        So here’s the thing: it depends on where you are. If you’re in the US:

        Biden has a shot at being elected, and got the Inflation Reduction Act passed:

        It’s also important to vote in all the down-ballot races. Vote in the primary of the party likely to win the general election where you are. Vote in the general election too.

        • Coreidan@lemmy.worldEnglish
          12·
          9 months ago

          I agree but we already voted Biden in which contradicts the statement of who I was replying to.

          but they do nothing to elect the people that could change things .

          Clearly not if we ALREADY voted for people that could change things.

          • silence7@slrpnk.netM
            3·
            9 months ago

            The US has has another election this year. Reelecting Biden, and giving him a Congress that will actually pass meaningful climate legislation is part of what we need.

            The reality is that the kind of change we need won’t be the work of a single Presidential term or session of Congress, or any one nation. Biden did what he could with the congress he had, where the Democrats had a majority in the Senate only by virtue of the Vice President being able to break ties, and even then, a couple Democrats (Manchin, Sinema) being bought off by the oil industry.