jan 1, 1866 - W. Stanley Jevons’s 'The coal question'
Description:
In the 19th century the focus shifted to coal as the most important source of energy and alarms
were raised that coal deposits may be exhausted. The most influential publication in this
regard was W. Stanley Jevons’s The coal question of 1866, in which he concluded that English
coal reserves would be depleted in a hundred years. Should the wasteful consumption of coal
continue unchanged, England would lose her dominant industrial position. Therefore it was
necessary to adopt ‘every means of sparing the fuel which makes our welfare’ (Jevons 1866: 5).
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