3 ms·
As a fraction of human endeavor on this planet, rather than using some monetary unit... What was the cost of light and heat in 1850 relative to human output?
by cduzz 4y ago
As a fraction of human endeavor on this planet, rather than using some monetary unit...
What was the cost of light and heat in 1850 relative to human output? Whaling and chopping wood and digging up coal, etc. 20%? 30% I'm sure it's been estimated. None of those 1850's assets survived electrification.
How many 50 year old infrastructure assets of the coal and natural gas ages are still working fine? Lots of them, I'd wager. $10 Trillion seems like a lot (and oh boy, it is a lot), but that's how the soil gets turned over for the next season's crop. We don't harvest whale oil for lights anymore, though it was the primary source of high quality light in the 1840s. We shouldn't burn oil from the ground to boil water to spin a thing to make electricity 800 miles away from the light today.
- chrisweekly 4y ago> "We don't harvest whale oil for lights anymore, though it was the primary source of high quality light in the 1840s. We shouldn't burn oil from the ground to boil water to spin a thing to make electricity 800 miles away from the light today." Amen! :)