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A Short History of Energy -- The Old Days

Before the industrial revolution, our energy needs were modest. For heat, we relied on the sun—and burned wood, straw, and dried dung when the sun failed us. For transportation, the muscle of horses and the power of the wind in our sails took us to every corner of the world. For work, we used animals to do jobs that we couldn't do with our own labor. Water and wind drove the simple machines that ground our grain and pumped our water. Simple machines based on the ability to harness the power of steam have been dated by some sources as far back as ancient Alexandria. The evolution of the steam engine continued over time and significantly ramped up in the 17th and 18th centuries. But it was the significant adaptations of Thomas Newcomer and James Watt in the mid-1700s that gave birth to the modern steam engine, opening up a world of possibility. A single steam engine, powered by coal dug from the mines of England and Appalachia, could do the work of dozens of horses. Before the Industrial Revolution, human energy use involved exploiting natural energy flows and renewable energy sources. It was estimated that at least 70% of all work was done by human muscle power and the rest done by domesticated animals.  More convenient than wind and water, and less expensive than a stable full of horses, steam engines were soon powering locomotives, factories, and farm implements. Coal was also used for heating buildings and smelting iron into steel. In 1880, coal powered a steam engine attached to the world's first electric generator. Thomas Edison's plant in New York City provided the first electric light to Wall Street financiers and the New York Times.

The Industrial Revolution, particularly the invention of the steam engine, enabled man to unlock the Earth's vast concentrated storage deposits of fossil fuels, namely coal, gas, and oil. Fossil fuels represent unique energy resources, highly concentrated, easily transported. Due to the development of various technologies that allowed for the widespread exploitation of fossil fuels, more energy was used by humans in the past 150 years than in all of previous human history.

Figure 1. The huge increase in world energy consumption that has taken place in roughly the last 200 years. This rise in energy consumption is primarily from increased fossil fuel use

 

Sources: Michael Brower, Cool Energy: Renewable Solutions to Environmental Problems, MIT Press, 1994. Vaclav Smil, Energy in World History, Westview Press, 1994. Daniel Yergin, The Prize: The Epic Quest for Oil, Money and Power, Touchstone, 1992. John Campbell, Collapse of an Industry: Nuclear Power and the Contradictions of US Policy, Cornell University Press, 1988. Richard Rudolph and Scott Ridley, Power Struggle: The Hundred-Year War over Electricity, Harper and Rowe, 198

Figure 2.

Daily Consumption of Energy per Capita

Source: E. Cook, "The Flow of Energy in an Industrial Society" Scientific American, 1971 p. 135.

Figure 3.

World Energy Consumption by Fuel, 1990-2035

(quadrillion Btu)

Figure 4.

Figure 5.

Source: Ren 21 Global Renewable Energy Report