Religion set the ground for our current ecological crises but it is not enough to consider just religion’s effect on the societal norms of today. One must take into account how democracy, capitalism, industrialization, and even globalization have molded history and the societal norms of today. The objective of our existence since society’s creation is to better ourselves and innovate; there was never any reason to consider our effect on the environment. This has in effect created our thirst for energy and the thought of conservation has never become apparent until energy became scarce and our effect on the environment was realized. The question I have is: Do we have the willpower to change these heavily ingrained societal norms in order to preserve the environment and even the human race?

A conversation the other day with a relative revealed a common misperception about how different energy sources are used by different sectors in the economy. My relative thought that oil was used in all electric / power plants. I corrected her and told her that coal was the predominant fuel source for electricity followed by hydropower and nuclear and to a far lesser extent wind and solar. I just looked up the current data on the US Dept. of Energy site and this is how fuel / use breaks down:

Petroleum – 39.8% …………………….. 70% used for Transportation / 24% for Industrial
Natural Gas – 22.6%……………………… 34% used for Industrail / 34% used for Residential
Coal – 22.6%……………………… 91% used for Electric power
Renewable – 6.8%……………………… 51% used for Electric power / 30% for Industrial
Nuclear – 8.4%…………………….. 100% used for Electric power

* This chart is found at:
http://www.eia.doe.gov/basics/energybasics101.html

So, just as today, in the past there was a distribution of different energy sources that served different sectors in the economy and also limitations due to access, transportation, suitability, and costs. In terms of the iron industry the American Colonies in 1770 were the third largest producer in the world behind Russia and Sweeden, exporting the bulk into England duty-free. But this industry was based an charcoal which consumed massive areas of forest as well as based on water power for power transmission for the bellows and hammers. Charcoal cannot be moved over long distances because it would break up and fragment and thus is limited by geography as is the water source for power transmission – the furnace had to go where those resources were – plus being near navigable water meant that the heavy pig or bar iron could be easily transported to markets near and far. By the middle of the 1800’s furnaces could use coke (anthracite coal being partially burned to remove volatiles), steam could be used to provide the source for power transmission needs, and locomotives and railroads could supply the transportation source for both raw supplies and the movement of products to markets. At the same time the older charcoal iron furnaces driven by water power certainly existed, serving the niche market in high quality wrought bar iron, just as ships powered by sail were contemporaneous with steam boats and locomotives. So wind power and solar power sources may take on an increasing percentage as sources in the electric power industry but will they be powering cars and airplanes? Not likely. One source or mode almost never completely supplants or substitutes for the other – the roles may change but the actors in energy and transportation are usually the same for long extended periods of time. The trick is to find transformative technologies that can equally match the economies of scale so that either the existing sources can be used much more efficiently or a new source can be adapted (such as steam was) to serve the demand in a particular sector. Often this requires entirely new infrastructures (such as rails in the 1800’s) that feed the demand for other industries (such as steel). So does this arise from the market or can it be done by the government? I think that history shows us that the market often shows us the way – the opportunity – and then the government takes up the national initiative and scale (think of the transcontinental railroad / the federal highway system / airports / the internet).

Cheers!
Dave

It was an energy revolution — the wood- or coal-fired steam engine that replaced wind, water and muscle as sources of power — that revolutionized American life in 100 years (a mere two or three generations) and made it possible for the nation to grow from a post-colonial backwater in 1800 to the most powerful industrial nation in the world by 1900. That 19th Century America was overflowing in those two energy resources, beginning as a vast forest at the start of the century and developing a seemingly inexhaustible supply of coal in the later decades. But old habits of thought and action have a way of persisting. Dual question: Is America so accustomed to enjoying increasing prosperity based on its vast energy resources that it is incapable of adjusting to an era of reduced energy availability? Or will new energy sources inevitably arise to meet Americans’ grand expectations, as coal came to replace wood in the 1800s?

Which leads to a querulous response to Kevin Olsen: Sufficient to the day is the energy thereof.

And somewhat less querulously (and more wordily) to David Harvey: The substitution of wood- and then coal-fueled transportation for wind and water power permitted the dispersion of economic activity to sites (cities) where kinds of resources other than energy (like labor) were available. A new reliance on wind power might reverse that trend, particularly if resistance (no pun intended) to construction of new power transmission lines prevents expansion of the electric grid.

Thanks…

Did Winston Churchill for instance foresee the future political problems in the Middle East when in the years before the First World War, he made the decision to fuel the Royal Navy with petroleum?

Here in the greater New York region we see the remnants of the energy infrastructure that brought Pennsylvania anthracite to the urban markets and industrial zones. To the best of my knowledge, the builders of the Morris Canal, the Lehigh Canal, the Delaware Canal, the Lackawanna Railroad, the Lehigh Valley Railroad, and the Central Railroad of New Jersey never anticipated the day that the regions they served would not run primarily on coal.

The Lackawanna Railroad was a pioneer in concrete construction technologies and the line’s bridges, retaining walls, elevated rights of way, and even stations were built to stand “until the glaciers come.” The railroad itself did not survive the shift from anthracite to petroleum.

The history of the last several hundred years has been that of exploiting fuels of ever increasing energy density and convenience. Wood fuel and water power are less efficient than coal, coal is less efficient than natural gas or petroleum, petroleum powered cars were more convenient than battery operated cars (at least with the technology of the early 1900s), nuclear (in theory at least) is more efficient than petroleum…etc. etc. etc. With the possible exception of nuclear energy the marketplace success of each successive fuel type made it seem that the day of inexpensive, convenient, and unlimited energy had finally arrived.

One has to wonder if we are going to feel the same way once high-efficiency solar collectors are available?

Kevin Olsen
Student in the Doctor of Environmental Management Program
Montclair State University

I’d like to ask about the historic relationship between power sources and places, or geography. Before the industrial revolution power in the western world was dominated by water power. Because a certain fall was needed to generate enough “head” to run water wheels you either had to locate in mountains by a reliable river or stream or to artificially amplify a water source through millponds and races, etc. So this meant that geography governed where industries and subsequent towns were located. It is my understanding that this fact is what led Shefield in Great Britain with seven rivers draining into the town to become such an industrial powerhouse (along with canals). Then, with the advent of steam, the source of energy changed from flowing water to contained water and a cheap and reliable heat source. And this, along with the ability to use anthracite coal /coke developed by Abraham Darby for iron furnaces, greatly expanded coal as primary source of energy and fuel into the 19th century. And the anthracite coal industry intensified the industrial belt in central and northeastern Pennsylvania and New York during the 19th century. So, if we have historically been tied to energy geographically what could we be tied to next? Will there be a “Sun-belt” or “Wind-belt” in our future?

Cheers!
Dave