Energy in History - The Basic Environmental History - page 5

Table 1.1 Daily and yearly per capita consumption of energy worldwide around 2000 (kcal, Toe
and %)

Sources kcal per capita per day Toe per capita per year (%)
3 Non organic 4,000 0.15 8
2 Organic fossil 40,000 1.47 80
1 Organic vegetable 6,000 0.22 12
50,000 1.84 100
Source IEA, World Energy Outlook 2010, OECD/IEA, Annex A, Tables for Scenario Projections
Note Organic Vegetable food, rewood and feed for working animals; Organic Fossil coal, oil,
natural gas; Non organic nuclear, wind, hydro, photovoltaic. Toe = ton oil equivalent =
10 million kcal

This composition of the energy balance reveals the strata of a long history of
technical conquests. 4 The history of energy technology is nothing else than the
chronological analysis of our present energy balance, in order to single out the
various ways of extracting energy from matter to produce heat, movement, light,
work etc. Following Table 1.1 , we will track the history of energy consumption
from the most remote layer (1) that is Organic vegetable sources, to the develop-
ment of Organic fossil sources, the intermediate stratum (2), and subsequently to
the progressing Non organic sources (3), which will be the basis of our future
energy systems. 5
From the viewpoint of energy, the long history of mankind could be divided into
two main epochs (corresponding to the rst two lines of Table 1.1 ):

First epoch the about 5 7 million years from the birth of the human species until

the early modern age, that is about 5 centuries ago, and

￿ -

￿ Second epoch the recent history of the last 500 years, which has witnessed a fast

acceleration in the pace of energy consumption.

rst long epoch, energy sources were represented by food for humans,
fodder for animals and

In the

rewood, that is biomass, with a small addition of water and
wind power. The second epoch witnesses the rapid partial replacement of the old
sources by fossil carriers, which became and still are the main energy sources.
While in the rst epoch energy was scarce, expensive and environmental changes

heavily in uenced its availability, during recent history energy has been plentiful,

its price relatively low and the in

uence of the energy consumption on the envi-

ronment considerable.

4

Still important on the big changes in the history of energy is the topic by Cipolla ( 1962 ).

5

is the expression used by Wrigley ( 1988 ). With reference to the history of
energy, the same term of “ organic ” had been used before by Cottrell ( 2009 ), See also Wrigley
( 2010 ).

“ Organic economies ”