The Historical Situation of

Energy
 The Old Days
Before industrial revolution our energy needs were modest.
For Heat:
 we relied on the Sun
 Burned wood, straw, and dried dung when the sun failed us
For Transportation:
• the muscle of horses
• the power of the wind in our sails took us to every corner of the world
For work:
• we used animals to do jobs which couldn't be done with human labor
 The Old Days
 Water and wind drove the simple machines that ground grain and
pumped water.

 The evolution of the steam engine continued over time and

significantly ramped up in the 17th and 18th centuries.

 Thomas Newcomen and James Watt in the mid 1700s that gave birth
to the modern steam engine, opening up a world of possibility.
 The Old Days
A single steam engine,

 powered by coal dug from the mines of England and Appalachia,

could do the work of dozens of horses .
were soon powering locomotives, factories, and farm implements.

# Coal was also used for heating buildings and smelting iron into steel.
Steam engine
 The Old Days

•
•
Electricity
• 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
 Electricity
Only a year later,
 the world's first hydroelectric plant went on-line in Appleton,
Wisconsin using Fast-flowing rivers that had turned wheels to grind
corn were now grinding out electricity instead
Within a few years,
Henry Ford hired his friend Edison to help build a small hydro plant to
power his home in Michigan.
Petroleum

By the late 1800s, a new form of

fuel was catching on: petroleum.
• oil became a valuable commodity
for lighting as the whale oil
industry declined.
• By the turn of the century, oil,
processed into gasoline, was firing
internal combustion engines.
Automobile
Horseless carriages were a rich
man's toy until Henry Ford
perfected
 the assembly-line method of
mass production for his Model
T. e. Quiet and clean, electric
cars
 When gas cars adopted
electric starters, their superior
range quickly drove the
electrics out of the market.
Another key invention of the era was
the safety bicycle,
 which had two wheels of the same
size, putting the rider much lower to
the ground than earlier bicycles.
 The pneumatic tire, invented by
John Dunlop, made cycling all the
more comfortable over the
cobblestone and dirt roads.
 Energy Takes Off

• Power plants became larger and larger, until we had massive coal
plants and hydroelectric dams.
• Power lines extended hundreds of miles between cities, bringing
electricity to rural areas during the Great Depression.
• The cheap car made suburbs possible, which in turn made cheap cars
necessary, feeding the cycle of suburban sprawl.
 Energy Takes Off

• Energy use grew quickly, doubling every 10 years.

• The cost of energy production was declining steadily,

• and the efficient use of energy was simply not a concern.

 Nuclear power
After World War II unleashed nuclear power,
 the world looked for a home for "the peaceful atom." They found it in
electricity production.
 Over 200 nuclear power plants were planned across the country, and
homes were built with all-electric heating systems to take advantage
of this power that would be "too cheap to meter."
 Human energy use
According to an analysis of historical human energy use published by
Western Oregon University,
• Our per capita food energy consumption has remained relatively
constant (within a range of 3:1 over most of human history),
• the energy we each use for the rest of our activities has grown
almost thirty times from our early agricultural days to the
consumption we now see in developed countries.
The world's population has increased by a similar amount in that time,
from 200 million in 1 CE to 6.6 billion today.
Per capita energy use
• non-food energy consumption of an
"advanced agricultural man" from
northern Europe in the 1400s were
20,000 kilo-calories per day is
converted to our standard measure of
tonnes of oil equivalent, it turns out
to be 0.75 toe per year.
• The consumption of an "early
industrial man" in 1875 was
estimated to be 2.5 toe per year.
• For comparison, the global average
per capita non-food energy
consumption in 1965 was only 1.2 toe
per year (Fig 1.4).
Human energy use disparity
Population historical growth caused by energy
use
 it is observed that our
planet has been changing
ever since due to energy
exchanges or “energy flows”
in different astrophysical,
geological, chemical,
biological, and intellectual
processes
Population historical growth caused by energy
use

PreIndustrial era encompasses human evolutionary survival and development of agriculture.

Industrial era starts with Industrial Revolution and use of fossil fuels (just a bleep on the human
history radar screen). Modern era start with human awareness of fossil fuel depletion and
environmental pollution concerns
Population historical growth caused by energy
use
• Standards of living and energy use have been growing almost
exponentially due to an abundance of resources (see Fig.)
• Today we humans have become sufficiently numerous and
technologically active that we may be having a global impact on our
planet Earth’s environment.
• Growth will be naturally restricted by overpopulation and resource
depletion (see Fig).
Population historical growth caused by
energy use
Two things are certain in the not-too-distant future
(1) The world population and its living-standard expectations will
increase substantially, and
(2) Economical reserves of fossil fuels, particularly oil and natural gas,
will decrease substantially
Population historical growth caused by energy
use
• The difficulties that will face every nation and the world in meeting
energy needs over the next several decades will be more challenging
than what we anticipate now.
• The traditional solutions and approaches will not solve the global
energy problem.
• New knowledge, new technology, and new living habits and
expectations must be developed, both to address the quantity of
energy needed to increase the standard of living worldwide and to
preserve and enhance the quality of our environment.