hjh hjhbnmb Series onkjhjh Energy consumption 1. Paolo Malanima, Energy consumption in Italy in the 19th and 20th centuries, 2006. 2. Paul Warde, Energy consumption in England & Wales 1560-2000, 2007. In copertina: Robert Boyle's first air-pump (engraving in New Experiments Physico-Mechanical), Oxford, 1660. Energy Consumption in England & Wales 1560-2000 Paul Warde Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche Istituto di Studi sulle Società del Mediterraneo Elaborazione ed impaginazione a cura di Antonio Marra ISBN 978-88-8080-082-8 Copyright © 2007 by Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche (CNR), Istituto di Studi sulle Società del Mediterraneo (ISSM). Tutti i diritti sono riservati. Nessuna parte di questa pubblicazione può essere fotocopiata, riprodotta, archiviata, memorizzata o trasmessa in qualsiasi forma o mezzo – elettronico, meccanico, reprografico, digitale – se non nei termini previsti dalla legge che tutela il Diritto d’Autore. INDEX Foreword 7 1. Traditional and modern energy sources 9 1.1. The energy transition and the Industrial Revolution 11 1.2. Studies of the British energy economy 13 1.3. Definitions 16 1.4. Primary sources 17 2. Energy consumption 19 2.1. Traditional sources 21 2.2. Food 23 2.3. Firewood 32 2.4. Animals 40 2.5. Wind 45 2.6. Water 49 2.7. Coal 57 2.8. Oil and gas 61 2.9. Primary electricity 62 2.10. Population 62 3. Structure, trend, level 65 3.1. Structure 67 3.2. Trend 71 3.3. Level 77 4. Analysis 81 4.1. Price and transitions 83 4.2. Energy and GDP 87 5. Conclusions 95 6 Index List of Abbreviations 101 References 103 Appendix 111 I Aggregate series 113 1. Energy consumption 115 2. The structure of energy consumption 123 3. Per capita energy consumption and energy intensity 131 FOREWORD This paper belongs in a series providing statistical data on energy consumption in Europe on a country-by-country basis for the early modern and modern ages. The primary aim of the series and this book in particular is to set out the data and the methods by which it was obtained. Any interpretation of these quantitative results within a wider economic perspective can only be preliminary. For ease of comparison the books will be laid out in a similar manner. After some introductory remarks on the pur- pose of this study and the definitions used therein, each car- rier is examined individually and the statistical methods em- ployed to create the series are explained. In the last chapter, the data is examined in a comparative perspective with other European experiences. The statistical series are presented in the Appendix. jjjlj 1. Traditional and modern energy sources òojlj 1. Traditional and modern energy sources 1.1. The energy transition and the Industrial Revolution The energy transition from traditional ‘vegetable’ or ‘or- ganic’ energy sources to modern fossil carriers marked a strong discontinuity in the availability and use of energy, and has been one of the main foundations of modern eco- nomic growth. In the well-known formulation of Tony Wrigley, the economy was no longer dependent on the ‘photosynthetic constraint’ imposed by the ability of plants to convert annual insolation into forms of energy useful to humans, but could exploit the ‘stored’ energy amassed over millions of years in the form of coal and oil. In Wrigley’s characterisation of transition, this is the very definition of the ‘Industrial Revolution’, a transition at least as profound as that from nomadic pastoralism to settled agriculture in the Neolitihic.1 Yet our knowledge of this major transformation is far from clear. Although Britain, even more than other Euro- pean countries, has been blessed with major and high qual- ity studies of the coal industry, the use of ‘traditional’ en- ergy carriers that predated the dominance of fossil fuels is very poorly researched. Until very recently the available sta- tistical information on energy in European historical ac- counting only concerned ‘modern’ sources. As coal ac- counted for around 95 percent of all energy consumption in Britain by the beginning of the 20th century, official energy statistics on energy carriers already provide us with an accu- 1 Wrigley (1988); Wrigley (2003); also Sieferle (2001). 12 Paul Warde rate picture of subsequent developments. However, for ear- lier periods the data on fossil fuels provides us with only one-half of the equation when it comes to understanding the nature of the transition itself. Thus most currently avail- able energy statistics can enlighten us as to when the steam- ship was adopted, but not when the sailing ship declined; when coal entered domestic hearths and industrial proc- esses, but not the extent of wood or peat burning before; when steam power began to underpin the mechanization of manufacturing, but not the degree to which earlier indus- trial development had depended on harnessing water or wind power. The energy consumption of those processes that pro- vided energy from organic matter cannot be overlooked if we want to gain a more accurate view of these past econo- mies. The imperative to achieve this is all the greater in the case of England, because along with the Netherlands it ap- pears to have achieved an exceptional level of development by the late 18th century, even before the substantial mecha- nization of manufacturing processes. Indeed, in the view of economic historians working in the past two decades, growth during the ‘classic’ Industrial Revolution itself has come to be understood as a gradual process, and one not strongly orientated towards heroic achievements in key sec- tors. The dependency of overall growth on mechanization and the application of heat to provide motive power via the steam engine is no longer the sine qua non of modern growth. Thus a partial approach to the Industrial Revolu- tion capable of clarifying only one side of the coin (that of fossil fuel consumption), would bias our perception of re- cent economic transformations. If we include traditional sources in our investigations, the interplay between the economy and energy, and the role of technology and infra- structure, can be analysed with much greater precision. The purpose of the present research is to quantify the consumption of all energy carriers over the entire period of Traditional and modern energy sources 13 the British energy transition up until the present day. Once the possibility of dynamic change was created in the balance of different energy carriers in the economy, processes of de- velopment and substitution have occurred almost continu- ously. Unusually however Britain’s transition is not a result of changes in (at the very most) the past two centuries, but must be traced right back to the middle of the 16th century. It is well known that coal had become the provider of the largest share of thermal energy by 1700, but in fact its dominance was established rather earlier. This work is part of a series comparative studies of the issues outlined above across several European countries. It thus owes a great debt of inspiration, and in the later com- parative sections, for data, to my colleagues in this endeav- our. This work would certainly not have been possible with- out the lengthy discussions and exchange of information I have enjoyed in recent years with: Ben Gales, Sofia Henri- ques, Astrid Kander, Fridolin Krausmann, Magnus Lind- mark, Paolo Malanima, Mar del Rubio, Heinz Schandl, Lennart Schön, Eric Tello, and Tony Wrigley. I have also benefited greatly from conversations and references from Leigh Shaw-Taylor and Simon Szreter. Out of this list two individuals should be singled out. Firstly, Astrid Kander, for her groundbreaking study of Swedish energy consump- tion, and development of methods for studying and visually presenting the data. Secondly, Paolo Malanima, who has generously encouraged work in these fields for a number of years, and whose first volume in this series of books on the energy consumption of different countries provided a model on which this work is at times very closely based. 1.2 Studies of the British energy economy There have been numerous studies of the British energy economy over the past two centuries, and thus we are for- 14 Paul Warde tunate to have a rich tradition of empirical work on which to draw. However, nearly all of these studies have been fo- cussed on the use of particular energy carriers (such as coal or electricity), rather than long-term developments in the aggregate total of consumption and the energy carrier mix. As different energy carriers have very different levels of effi- ciency (the efficiency of processes of combustion, for exam- ple, tend to be rather low in comparison to modern water turbines), the energy carrier mix has considerable implica- tions for the overall energy efficiency of the economy. Stud- ies of ‘traditional’ carriers have been rather more limited in extent and scope. However, studies of the long-term aggregate energy his- tory of the United Kingdom have been attempted within the field of energy economics. First among these was the work of Humphrey and Stanislaw, published in 1979 and draw- ing on a mix of secondary works and recent national statis- tics. Their analysis reached back to 1700 and sought to ex- plain shifts in an ‘energy coefficient’, the ratio between the rate of change in aggregate energy consumption and the rate of change in output growth, and thus a kind of measure of changes in energy intensity (the energy required to pro- duce each unit of income). While they discussed the possi- ble power output of water- and windmills, these were not factored into their aggregate analysis that simply rested on fossil fuels and modern hydropower.2 A similar approach has been taken more recently by Fouquet and Pearson, us- ing only ‘modern carriers’ for their aggregate analyses and figures, but providing a literature survey of developments in energy use over the last millennium.3 Discussion of energy transitions in Britain, and especially during the Industrial Revolution, have largely revolved around debates on what prompts technological change in 2 Humphrey and Stanislaw (1979).