Origins: Carbon Dioxide & Climate Change
On February 16, 1938, Guy Stewart Callendar (1898-1964) gave the world the first warning about Carbon Dioxide and its effects on our global climate. Yet it was not until the latter half of the 20th century that climate change started to catch the public’s eye.
In this article I will summarize Callendar’s life and contribution to modern climatology.
Guy Steward Callendar was born on February 9th, 1898 to Hugh Callendar and Victoria Stewart. Hugh was a physics professor at McGill University in Montreal, Quebec, Canada and is famous for his research in thermodynamics. Guy’s father would make sure that he received a proper education by enrolling him into a very elite, private school, Durston House School, in Ealing, London. In 1919 Guy Callendar entered City and Guild College, in South Kensington, London, where he earned a certificate in Mechanics and Mathematics. After graduating he went to work at the Imperial College assisting his father on the problems of steam engineering.
In 1938, in the paper The Artificial Production of Carbon Dioxide and its Influence on Temperature (see attached pdf), Callendar compiled measurements of temperatures from the 18th and 19th centuries and correlated them to measurements of atmospheric Carbon Dioxide concentrations. This was the first time that Carbon Dioxide was linked to warming in the atmosphere.
In this paper, Callendar made several observations that would influence modern climatology:
- Burning of fossil fuels by man has added 150,000 million tons of carbon dioxide into the air from the late 1800s to early 1900s.
- Carbon Dioxide and Water Vapor are very good absorbers of infrared radiation.
- Half of the observed temperature increase in the early 1900s was due to the accumulation of artificially produced Carbon Dioxide in the atmosphere
- Temperatures had increased by an average of 0.005°C per year during the late 1800s to early 1900s.
- That if you doubled the Carbon Dioxide, in 1938, you would see a +2.0°C increase in temperature.
The process of Carbon Dioxide warming the atmosphere would come to be known as the Callendar Effect, or in modern times, the Greenhouse Gas Effect. Since Callendar gave the warning about increasing Carbon Dioxide in the atmosphere, why were there not any dramatic changes in fossil fuel usage?
While Callendar’s contribution was revolutionary to meteorology in the 1900s, and is also fundamental to modern climatology, Guy Callendar was relatively unknown at the time. Therefore, there was a lot of criticism of this work, some of which can be seen at the end of his article in the discussion section. After reading it, you get the feeling that Guy Callendar’s work was not viewed positively.
Another reason his work as not taken seriously until the mid-20th century, was that the world did not warm further as he predicted. However, despite a brief cooling period, the world has resumed its increase in temperature.
In conclusion, Guy Stewart Callendar’s work was not widely accepted until later observations supported his theory. Sadly, he died in 1964 and would not get to see his revolutionary work become accepted as scientific fact. Nowadays, introductory textbooks include his theory on Carbon Dioxide. If the scientific community would have not criticized his work back in the early 1900s, where would we as a society be today? If you, the reader, have not read Callendar’s paper, I encourage you to view the attached document courtesy of the Royal Meteorological Society in London.
? Will Hatheway 2020
? Royal Meteorological Society
RESOURCES
Image of Callendar University of East Anglia Archive
Fleming, J. R. (2007). The Callendar effect: The life and work of Guy Stewart Callendar (1898-1964), the scientist who established the carbon dioxide theory of climate change. Boston, Mass: American Meteorological Society.
Callendar, G.S. (1938), The artificial production of carbon dioxide and its influence on temperature. Q.J.R. Meteorol. Soc., 64: 223-240. doi:10.1002/qj.49706427503