Today, climate change is a hot topic. But it’s not new—the idea of global warming has been circulating for centuries. In 1824, Jean Baptiste Fourier found evidence that Earth’s atmosphere was trapping heat from the sun and hypothesized that this could cause “a kind of greenhouse effect” over time.
In 1896 Svante Arrhenius predicted the rise in atmospheric carbon dioxide levels due to increased industrialization would lead to a warmer planet. And as early as 1957, Charles David Keeling began measuring CO2 concentrations at Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii and discovered they were steadily increasing year-over-year.
Yet despite these long warnings about climate change, humans have only recently begun taking steps to mitigate the problem. Why?
Charles David Keeling began measuring CO2 concentrations at Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii and discovered they were steadily increasing year-over-year.
The Founding of the IPCC
In 1988, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was established to provide policy makers with regular assessments about climate change impacts and mitigation strategies. It was then that the international community agreed to meet every five years in order to take stock of climate change research and consider policy options to address them.
The Second Assessment Report (SAR) was released in 1995, followed by the Third Assessment Report (TAR) in 2001. The release of SAR marked a turning point in climate change policy, as it was the first time scientists, government representatives, and environmental advocates met to discuss this issue. And in 2007, the Copenhagen Summit produced a follow-up report called Climate Change: The Physical Science Basis .
The IPCC was established in 1988, not 1995. The SAR was released in 1990, followed by the TAR in 1996. In 2007 the IPCC published Climate Change: The Physical Science Basis.
The Founding of the EPA and Clean Air Act Amendments (1990)
In 1963, President John F. Kennedy addressed Congress, saying “no single technological innovation has greater potential for…benefiting mankind” than pollution control technology. And this year marks half a century since the introduction of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), which was empowered to set and enforce environmental regulations.
The Clean Air Act Amendments (CAAA) was also passed this year, giving the U.S. more control over how industry emitted air pollutants—including greenhouse gases like CO2 that trap heat in our atmosphere.
The EPA then had the power to regulate these emissions for both new and existing power plants. The CAAA also created a trading system for carbon dioxide emissions, which was later used in the creation of the Chicago Climate Exchange in 2003.
The Bottom Line
It took nearly 200 years for humans to begin majorly addressing climate change with collective efforts. Even though scientists have been warning us about climate change for decades, it wasn’t until more recently that people started making commitments to enact change.