Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
developed nations a true
of forests from fuel wood extraction had to
wait for the massive diffusion of gas cylinders during the 1950s, which put a sudden
end to the last boom in charcoal burning for cooking stoves.
The fate of European woodlands may have been closely linked to urbanization.
However, while charcoal production has been mainly studied in relation to tradi-
tional iron smelting, little attention has been paid to this role in relation to the
substitution of
“
liberation
”
replaces by stoves in growing towns and cities. Some oral memory
and other anthropological sources suggest that until the 1950s, in many regions
located far away from a cheap coal supply, stoves were usually burnt with charcoal.
Charcoal production seems to have grown hand in hand with the increasing use of
stoves in urban areas, and peaked just before the arrival of gas cylinders. A his-
torical geography of coal-supplied and charcoal-provided cities, and their respective
evolution during the 19th and
rst half of the 20th century, would help to trace the
changes in woodlands in Europe, so as to identify the main turning points and their
major drivers. Taking into account that developing nations are experiencing a
fast urbanization at present, while simultaneously providing the highest share of
wooden raw materials consumed in developed countries, being better informed
of past European energy and landscape transitions could greatly help to redress the
huge World deforestation.
120
A careful accounting of biophysical urban socio-metabolic
ows would thus
help a lot in assessing this long-running link between forest landscapes, urbani-
zation and energy transitions. The wood issue seems only to have been one part of
the ever-expanding
fl
generated by changing consumption
patterns as industrialization and urbanisation processes got underway. In addition to
'
ecological footprint
'
rewood, charcoal and timber, the historical approach to urban social metabolism
includes the consumption of cereals, meat, milk and other food products, together
with the excretion of wastes, which constitutes another interesting
eld of research
for human ecology, ecological economics and environmental history.
121
2.10 Concluding Remarks
Despite being neither complete nor exhaustive, the examples presented in ongoing
debates and current research show a great interest of a further dialogue and inter-
disciplinary collaboration between environmental and economic history. These
examples also show, however, that the strongest barrier lies in the mainstream
approach to economic growth and macroeconomic theories which neglect the role
of energy and other natural resources. Yet, adopting a common bio-physical and
socio-metabolic approach, linked to land-use and global environmental changes,
120
Williams (
2003
).
121
Stanhill (
1984
), Schmid Neset (
2005
) and Billen et al. (
2009
).
