Energy and the Poverty of Nations
April 10th 2024
Doing work to create wealth requires energy. In this 13-minute video, Dr. John Constable compares energy sources that vary enormously in quality and thus their ability to create wealth. Humans initially developed the ability to do work with energy from organic sources other than food – mostly wood (an energy source of medium thermodynamic quality) – which allowed development of moderately complex agricultural societies. But these were generally poor and vulnerable to external shocks. Any excess wealth generated usually flowed to land-owning aristocrats, who enjoyed huge socio-economic power, while everyone else worked as low-income laborers with little social mobility.
In the late Medieval period in NW Europe the fuel supply began to diversify, initially using peat. Then Britain adopted coal, which is solar energy in the form of complex organic molecules, compressed by gravitational force and chemically transformed by the resulting temperatures to produce a concentrated fuel of exceptional thermodynamic quality. When burned it produces high temperatures and a tremendous capacity to do work. As a result Britain, and then the rest of the world, enjoyed an exponential increase in wealth from high quality fuels. The surplus energy enabled manufacturing and commerce to dwarf the power of the landowners, resulting in a more tolerant and trusting civil society, and a healthier place to raise families. High quality fuels such as coal, oil, gas, and more recently uranium, have delivered an increase in human welfare unprecedented in previous history.
The last 20 years has seen an attempt to switch to wind and solar power, which are diffuse and of low thermodynamic quality. They can’t do as much work or create as much wealth as the high-quality, concentrated fuels. Investment in wind and solar is vast, reducing investment elsewhere and increasing consumer energy costs. As a result, since 2005 the UK’s total energy consumption has dropped 28% and electricity 25% as the cost of renewables rose. The high cost of collecting, converting and delivering diffuse and low-quality wind and solar energy threatens a return of poverty and constriction of opportunity. The living standards for all but the very rich are falling. The young are reluctant to raise families since they can’t afford houses. Power is shifting back to those who own land and to the energy sector.
However, Dr. Constable says that it’s not too late to put the UK on a thermodynamically-sound energy footing. He sees gas and nuclear as the best choices in the medium term for electricity and industrial heat. Oil will continue to be essential for transport for the foreseeable future.
Credits to Friends of Science, Ian Cameron
friendsofscience.org
In the late Medieval period in NW Europe the fuel supply began to diversify, initially using peat. Then Britain adopted coal, which is solar energy in the form of complex organic molecules, compressed by gravitational force and chemically transformed by the resulting temperatures to produce a concentrated fuel of exceptional thermodynamic quality. When burned it produces high temperatures and a tremendous capacity to do work. As a result Britain, and then the rest of the world, enjoyed an exponential increase in wealth from high quality fuels. The surplus energy enabled manufacturing and commerce to dwarf the power of the landowners, resulting in a more tolerant and trusting civil society, and a healthier place to raise families. High quality fuels such as coal, oil, gas, and more recently uranium, have delivered an increase in human welfare unprecedented in previous history.
The last 20 years has seen an attempt to switch to wind and solar power, which are diffuse and of low thermodynamic quality. They can’t do as much work or create as much wealth as the high-quality, concentrated fuels. Investment in wind and solar is vast, reducing investment elsewhere and increasing consumer energy costs. As a result, since 2005 the UK’s total energy consumption has dropped 28% and electricity 25% as the cost of renewables rose. The high cost of collecting, converting and delivering diffuse and low-quality wind and solar energy threatens a return of poverty and constriction of opportunity. The living standards for all but the very rich are falling. The young are reluctant to raise families since they can’t afford houses. Power is shifting back to those who own land and to the energy sector.
However, Dr. Constable says that it’s not too late to put the UK on a thermodynamically-sound energy footing. He sees gas and nuclear as the best choices in the medium term for electricity and industrial heat. Oil will continue to be essential for transport for the foreseeable future.
Credits to Friends of Science, Ian Cameron
friendsofscience.org
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