Contrary to popular belief, Al Gore did not invent the theory of man-made climate change. Does this sound like him?

As for the climate of the future: science has done an about-face from its once-prevailing view that the earth was gradually cooling off and would wind up icy and barren ... Now, evidence points unmistakably to a climate that's getting warming all the time. Besides glacial melting all over the earth, actual temperature rises have been recorded over the past century in cities throughout the northern hemisphere, and various warm-weather fish have been noted in recent years migrating far north of their usual habitats.

The newest theory of climatic change attributes it to man's own doing. It's because of the sizable increase in carbon dioxide found in the atmosphere these days, due to industrial activities and forest fires. Millions of tons of CO₂ are being sent into the air constantly from these causes.

An increase of 50 per cent in the carbon dioxide concentration of the earth's atmosphere could happen in the next century, which could easily happen at the present rate it's being discharged, could raise the surface temperature of the globe about 2.2 degrees centigrade. Eventually this CO₂ factor could make an extreme change in climate everywhere.

According to the always awesome iO9 blog, the above appeared in a popular American magazine called Pageant in February, 1955.

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It should come as a surprise to absolutely no-one that many of the world's richest and most powerful banks are pushing hard for the introduction of a 'no caps' world trading market for carbon :

A group representing some of the world’s leading banks will urge the United States and other industrial nations this week to move quickly to introduce a lightly regulated system for trading carbon emissions permits.

Permit-trading systems offer banks a potentially vast new business. For it to grow, leading economies — particularly the United States — will need to set limits on the quantities of greenhouse gases that can be released and to allow companies in other parts of the world to buy emissions permits.

The banking companies, which include Citigroup, Lehman Brothers Holdings and Morgan Stanley, are giving strong signs that Wall Street wants Washington to open the way to reduced emissions using a trading system based on the Kyoto Protocol, an agreement the United States did not ratify, rather than by enacting carbon taxes.

The group also includes European institutions like BNP Paribas, Barclays Capital and Deutsche Bank, as well as niche investment banks like Climate Change Capital and the law firms of Baker & McKenzie and DLA Piper.

“Price caps should play a very limited role in the system,” said Gia Schneider, a vice president for carbon markets at Credit Suisse, which is a member of the lobbying group. “Such policies could lead to market distortions and stymie efforts to raise enough capital to fund new energy technologies such as windmills and solar power.”

Carbon traders say emissions permits could become the world’s largest commodities market...