The first wave of debate about the Ice Age in New Zealand took place between 1860 and 1880. The pioneering geological surveys of Julius von Haast demonstrated that the glaciers of the Southern Alps of the South Island had been much larger in the past. Haast initially explained the geological evidence using Charles Lyell’s drift theory involving debris-laden icebergs, but he quickly abandoned this for a version of Louis Agassiz’s hypothesis of widespread terrestrial glaciation. Haast’s arguments set off a heated debate amongst New Zealand scientists. Haast and his interlocuters went back and forth on the question of causation. They recognized that climate change could explain the evidence, but ultimately the consensus went against this view in favour of land elevation. The acrimony of the debate is partly traceable to the personal and provincial tensions that crisscrossed New Zealand science at the time. Furthermore, around the edges of the main debate others argued that climate change had in fact occurred. James Croll’s theory of climate change due to variations in the earth’s orbit was a popular alternative viewpoint. I contend that the resistance amongst leading New Zealand scientists to the notion of climate change stemmed primarily from their interpretation of Lyell’s uniformitarianism. However, geographically specific factors may have also contributed to their perspective: New Zealand is a chain of islands in the temperate belt, it is a tectonically active country, and its isolation entails a less variable fossil record than continental environments.

In October 1957, the Australian capital of Canberra hosted a meeting of the UNESCO Arid Zone Programme, which represented the culmination of efforts to cement the nation's involvement in what would soon become a UNESCO Major Project. That such a conference would unfold on Australian soil had not been assured when Australian officials considered India’s proposal in Beirut nearly a decade earlier. Drawing on hitherto unexamined papers, this paper examines how Australia changed course and subsequently became involved in the UNESCO arid zone programme. Despite the reservations of some officials, its Australian advocates could align the programme’s interests in food production, population growth, and scientific internationalism, I argue, with domestic concerns about immigration restriction and the nation’s place in the region. This paper shows, to paraphrase historian Perrin Selcer, how seemingly ‘useless lands’ became useful to Australian (and UNESCO) interests.

Recent historiography of weather and climate has emphasised a dichotomy between global and local conceptualisations of the atmosphere, with “local” denoting a range between the subnational and the human individual. Within historiographies that examine the global atmosphere, national histories are usually denigrated as stepping stones towards the eventual global endeavour of atmospheric science. However, I will argue that the national scale still has much to offer in terms of new directions for the history of weather/climate and society, using the case study of the uses of atmospheric information in the utilities industries. National legislation and industrial relations determined what sort of atmospheric information became important and when, and the integration of national grids required utilities managers to create systemwide demand forecasts that were heavily weather-dependent. After this case study, I highlight other examples of where a national viewpoint might benefit histories of weather and climate.