Development of an Electrical Industrial Revolution

[DominusNovus]

Suppose that, during the 17th and 18th centuries, a series of breakthroughs are made in the study of electricity, accelerating that field of study such that, the first primitive electric generators - and with them, electric motors - have been built in the early 18th century. These devices supplant the various pressure engines that would eventually culminate in Watt’s steam engine, as it is comparatively easy to turn steam into rotational energy - and thus, electricity - than it is to deal with the pressures involved with steam engines. And rotational energy is easy enough to use to drive pumps.

The important part is that the piston-driven steam engine is largely supplanted by electric engines. Electricity, in general, is superior to steam power for doing work in factories, while steam power is, in general, superior for transportation by rail or ship (and yes, much of this electricity would be generated by steam, regardless).

So what does this industrial revolution look like? The ultimate source of power will still largely be water wheels and steam from burning coal, so the locations of early factories are likely to be the same. But as society gets better at building wires cheaply, it can more quickly move factories to more convenient locations.

 

[Jürgen]

Suppose that, during the 17th and 18th centuries, a series of breakthroughs are made in the study of electricity, accelerating that field of study such that, the first primitive electric generators - and with them, electric motors - have been built in the early 18th century. These devices supplant the various pressure engines that would eventually culminate in Watt’s steam engine, as it is comparatively easy to turn steam into rotational energy - and thus, electricity - than it is to deal with the pressures involved with steam engines. And rotational energy is easy enough to use to drive pumps.

The important part is that the piston-driven steam engine is largely supplanted by electric engines. Electricity, in general, is superior to steam power for doing work in factories, while steam power is, in general, superior for transportation by rail or ship (and yes, much of this electricity would be generated by steam, regardless).

So what does this industrial revolution look like? The ultimate source of power will still largely be water wheels and steam from burning coal, so the locations of early factories are likely to be the same. But as society gets better at building wires cheaply, it can more quickly move factories to more convenient locations.

As I have suggested earlier this will favor areas of Europe with high hydro power potential and easy access to the sea or major rivers. The Norwegian coastline would be such a example, but also the Alps and the Carpathians.

So if this hit eagerly enough that Denmark-Norway is still a Union we may see a shift of Denmark-Norway where Norway become the industrial center and money maker for the dual kingdom, while Denmark is reduced to little more than the breadbasket feeding the industrial cities of Norway.

While in case of Austria, the Austrians may end up the industrial power house of Europe.

Again if it hit early Venice may end up Belgium of TTL and the Po Valley will be a even more important actor than in OTL.

In the UK region such as Scotland will likely also be something of a winner.

 

[DominusNovus]

As I have suggested earlier this will favor areas of Europe with high hydro power potential and easy access to the sea or major rivers. The Norwegian coastline would be such a example, but also the Alps and the Carpathians.

So if this hit eagerly enough that Denmark-Norway is still a Union we may see a shift of Denmark-Norway where Norway become the industrial center and money maker for the dual kingdom, while Denmark is reduced to little more than the breadbasket feeding the industrial cities of Norway.

While in case of Austria, the Austrians may end up the industrial power house of Europe.

Again if it hit early Venice may end up Belgium of TTL and the Po Valley will be a even more important actor than in OTL.

In the UK region such as Scotland will likely also be something of a winner.

I’m curious what you think is the main differentiator between this scenario and the historical events that would help these regions. In the historical Industrial Revolution, for example, water power played the primary power source for quite awhile. So many of these places could have industrialized anyway.

I’d say a power source plus labor surplus (and easy transportation access to raw materials and/or customers) is what really matters.

 

[Polish Eagle]

I’m curious what you think is the main differentiator between this scenario and the historical events that would help these regions. In the historical Industrial Revolution, for example, water power played the primary power source for quite awhile. So many of these places could have industrialized anyway.

I’d say a power source plus labor surplus (and easy transportation access to raw materials and/or customers) is what really matters.

Didn't the Hapsburg realms and Italy have available labor surpluses? Galicia was known for a high fertility rate and rampant poverty, which could make it a source of industrial labor for hydroelectric-powered factories elsewhere in the Empire. Italy also saw an exodus of laborers from the south after unification and the abolition of the agricultural tariffs that kept the plantations there afloat for a time. ITTL, you might instead see Sicilian and Calabrian migration to the Po valley.

 

[DominusNovus]

Didn't the Hapsburg realms and Italy have available labor surpluses? Galicia was known for a high fertility rate and rampant poverty, which could make it a source of industrial labor for hydroelectric-powered factories elsewhere in the Empire. Italy also saw an exodus of laborers from the south after unification and the abolition of the agricultural tariffs that kept the plantations there afloat for a time. ITTL, you might instead see Sicilian and Calabrian migration to the Po valley.

Certainly there were labor surpluses, and I could see good things for northern Italy, to be sure. But when Austria was mentioned, I assumed that meant Austria proper, not the entirety of their empire.

 

[Polish Eagle]

Certainly there were labor surpluses, and I could see good things for northern Italy, to be sure. But when Austria was mentioned, I assumed that meant Austria proper, not the entirety of their empire.

Austria itself can be the center of industrialization, but the labor can migrate in from elsewhere, if the economic groundwork for rapid industrialization is laid early (in other words, the flow that IOTL went to London and the US goes to Vienna and Venice instead).

 

[DominusNovus]

Austria itself can be the center of industrialization, but the labor can migrate in from elsewhere, if the economic groundwork for rapid industrialization is laid early (in other words, the flow that IOTL went to London and the US goes to Vienna and Venice instead).

But why would it? Austria is a terrible place for an industrial center - its up in the mountains, and, while it does have access to both the Rhine and the Danube, if you want access to those rivers, there's places that are closer to sea.

 

[Zireael]

Looking at the Wikipedia for "history of electric cars", some random priest and physicist built an electric motor in 1828, and soon afterwards, similar devices were made in Scotland and Germany. The first known electric locomotive is also from Scotland, 1837. Lead-acid battery was invented in 1859, and in 1881, a marine outboard motor was made. Electrical trains were in use in mines because they did not use up oxygen. Late 1890s and early 1900s seem to have been an electric golden age, before internal combustion developed more (e.g. muffler and electric starter eliminated hand-cranking and majority of the noise) and road networks were expanded beyond the range electric cars provided.

I was going to say it should be fairly easy to push some if not all of these back a hundred years (swap a 7 for an 8). Actually, digging in more, the first electric motors seem to have been electrostatic devices (never used for anything practical since they need very high voltage). In 1799, you have the invention of the electrochemical battery after which the progress just... exploded. Only twenty years later you have Coulomb's law and Faraday demonstrating that a wire and magnets can create a current. And that wire-and-magnets trick is basically what modern motors still use, so... there you have it.

 

[Simeon]

Europe would have certainly seen a brighter future, though not as much for salmon

Still, assuming the hydroelectric origins of the turbine, it still won't entirely butterfly away the development of steam and fossil fuel engines considering the energy density of fossil fuels that none-riverine cities and economies would have only found useful to compete with (albeit at a smaller, yet more intensive scale), and the delay in the electrification of the railways.

If there's a United States analogue in this world, or at least if either Pennsylvania or Texas is not a political basketcase, I fear that the runaway power-grabbing that petroleum magnates had done IOTL can still be easily recreated, all for the want of shipping grain and establishing industry out of the Midwest (even as a politically fragmented continent, maybe even more so if that political fragmentation meant protectionism and industrial redundancy).

Looking at the Wikipedia for "history of electric cars", some random priest and physicist built an electric motor in 1828, and soon afterwards, similar devices were made in Scotland and Germany. The first known electric locomotive is also from Scotland, 1837. Lead-acid battery was invented in 1859, and in 1881, a marine outboard motor was made. Electrical trains were in use in mines because they did not use up oxygen. Late 1890s and early 1900s seem to have been an electric golden age, before internal combustion developed more (e.g. muffler and electric starter eliminated hand-cranking and majority of the noise) and road networks were expanded beyond the range electric cars provided.

I was going to say it should be fairly easy to push some if not all of these back a hundred years (swap a 7 for an 8). Actually, digging in more, the first electric motors seem to have been electrostatic devices (never used for anything practical since they need very high voltage). In 1799, you have the invention of the electrochemical battery after which the progress just... exploded. Only twenty years later you have Coulomb's law and Faraday demonstrating that a wire and magnets can create a current. And that wire-and-magnets trick is basically what modern motors still use, so... there you have it.

I believe it would have been trams at first, overhead wires and all; why settle for individual carriages when buses are more efficient, after all?

Though to be fair, if the electromagnetic theory had been understood that far this early, then more advanced chemistry and quantum mechanics that enabled current-day Tesla cars ust not be that far off anyways.

Unfortunately, North America may have built itself around fossil fueled transport by then.

 

[Jürgen]

I’m curious what you think is the main differentiator between this scenario and the historical events that would help these regions. In the historical Industrial Revolution, for example, water power played the primary power source for quite awhile. So many of these places could have industrialized anyway.

Water power was important especially in the period up to Industrial Revolution, but in OTL it was the places with coal which ended up industrial centers, not the region with water power those region only really benefitted in the late 19th century.

I’d say a power source plus labor surplus (and easy transportation access to raw materials and/or customers) is what really matters.

OTL Industrialization was about agricultural improvement freeing up labor, agricultural improvements enabling large urban populations, easy transport enable these region access to food, removal of trade barrier making mass production viable, and the scientific method enable continued improvement in manufacturing technics.

The Habsburg domains was after Maria Theresa’s reform the biggest free trade zone in the world, it had access to vast amount of hydro power, rivers which made transportation easy and had large amount agricultural land. But it’s coal field mostly lay outside the the main watershed (Danube) of the empire (in Bohemia, Galicia and the Austrian Netherlands). Here we could see a shift to regions like Upper and Lower Austria, Burgenland and the lowland of Upper Hungary.

As for Denmark-Norway in OTL we saw the start of the manufacturing I described but then the Napoleonic Wars hit and Norway lost access to the Danish breadbasket and railroads made inner Sweden more viable for similar development in Sweden-Norway. If electric hydropower had been viable in the mid 18th century this development would have hit a lot harder and Norway would likely have taken off as a major industrial region.

 

[Jürgen]

But why would it? Austria is a terrible place for an industrial center - its up in the mountains, and, while it does have access to both the Rhine and the Danube, if you want access to those rivers, there's places that are closer to sea.

Austria is dominated by a major agricultural valley along the Danube, it’s pretty much perfect for hydropower.

 

[Mad Bad Rabbit]

In 1700, copper costs £150/ton and world production is only ~ 200 tons/year. A single 200 HP engine plus the generator to run it and a few km of transmission line connecting them would easily use up two tons of copper.

 

[Zireael]

That's a good point, but you aren't getting 200 HP engine around 1700. The first engines will be something like 2-3 HP.

 

[DominusNovus]

Europe would have certainly seen a brighter future, though not as much for salmon

Still, assuming the hydroelectric origins of the turbine, it still won't entirely butterfly away the development of steam and fossil fuel engines considering the energy density of fossil fuels that none-riverine cities and economies would have only found useful to compete with (albeit at a smaller, yet more intensive scale), and the delay in the electrification of the railways.

If there's a United States analogue in this world, or at least if either Pennsylvania or Texas is not a political basketcase, I fear that the runaway power-grabbing that petroleum magnates had done IOTL can still be easily recreated, all for the want of shipping grain and establishing industry out of the Midwest (even as a politically fragmented continent, maybe even more so if that political fragmentation meant protectionism and industrial redundancy).



I believe it would have been trams at first, overhead wires and all; why settle for individual carriages when buses are more efficient, after all?

Though to be fair, if the electromagnetic theory had been understood that far this early, then more advanced chemistry and quantum mechanics that enabled current-day Tesla cars ust not be that far off anyways.

Unfortunately, North America may have built itself around fossil fueled transport by then.

I'd caution from thinking that we'd see non-combustion sources of energy supplant combustion. It is quite likely that this scenario would still lead to coal and then oil being the predominant sources of energy - remember that most electricity in the world comes from burning coal. What this would mean, however, is skipping much of the relatively cumbersome early steps of turning power from steam into useful power - no vast belt systems or drive shafts that factories are built around. Similarly, the factories (and cities) would likely be lit almost a century earlier. Plus, if you're transmitting power throughout cities earlier, you're also enabling various labor saving devices earlier. Whether or not they're economical that early on, for the average family, devices such as electric washing machines would be technically practical that early on - you can't expect the average family to have a steam engine to drive a steam powered washing machine, but if they have electricity, then it does become practical.

 

[Polish Eagle]

I'd caution from thinking that we'd see non-combustion sources of energy supplant combustion. It is quite likely that this scenario would still lead to coal and then oil being the predominant sources of energy - remember that most electricity in the world comes from burning coal. What this would mean, however, is skipping much of the relatively cumbersome early steps of turning power from steam into useful power - no vast belt systems or drive shafts that factories are built around. Similarly, the factories (and cities) would likely be lit almost a century earlier. Plus, if you're transmitting power throughout cities earlier, you're also enabling various labor saving devices earlier. Whether or not they're economical that early on, for the average family, devices such as electric washing machines would be technically practical that early on - you can't expect the average family to have a steam engine to drive a steam powered washing machine, but if they have electricity, then it does become practical.

Even if they're not economical for the average family, urban pay-to-use systems like laundromats can distribute the cost.

Earlier electric refrigerators are another possibility, if electricity exists.

 

[DominusNovus]

Even if they're not economical for the average family, urban pay-to-use systems like laundromats can distribute the cost.

Earlier electric refrigerators are another possibility, if electricity exists.

Agreed. The key part is that all these various conveniences that were introduced around the end of the 19th century to the beginning of the 20th century could be introduced earlier. Interestingly, rail cars cooled by ice were the standard well into the electric era - in this case, as the Old West is being settled in America, refrigeration technology should be sufficiently advanced that it will be common for there to be refrigerated cars around the mid 19th century. On a related technology

That said, I've been mainly thinking of technologies that are extremely simple to extrapolate from readily available electric power, such as your standard rotational or reciprocal motion from an electric motor, or lighting. Those are the easy ones. Everything else requires just a tad more refinement that may or may not be sped up.

With *that* said, it is interesting to consider what this means for the US South - with air conditioning comes a population influx from the North, or directly from Europe. That will be quite interesting - a fun little piece of misunderstood history is that the political re-alignment of the US South in the second half of the 20th century almost perfectly coincides with middle class northerners settling in the South - those counties in which they did not settle remained very consistent in their voting patterns. So, if there's air conditioning anywhere near a century early, imagine how much that will disrupt the slavery debate.

A more secure prediction would be that, in the 19th century, you'll see intra-city rail networks be dominated by electric locomotives likely from the start. Since one of the big hurdles to overcome for subways was what to do with exhaust smoke, if electricity is more advanced, expect to see the first real subway systems being built maybe as much as a half century early - London's Tube could be a product of the 1840s-50s.

 

[Mad Bad Rabbit]

If they have electromagnets a century earlier, then they have telegraphs and phones, which will be a way bigger societal impact than electric fans for rich people.

 

[DominusNovus]

If they have electromagnets a century earlier, then they have telegraphs and phones, which will be a way bigger societal impact than electric fans for rich people.

Certainly a valid point. That could butterfly away various political failures exacerbated by slow communication - the American Revolution could be avoided, for example. On the other hand, 18th century technology might not be up to the task of laying a trans-Atlantic cable a century early. So, perhaps this would actually exacerbate the fall of colonial empires - the Thirteen Colonies would have a much easier time coordinating their response to Parliament and the King - at least until the war begins and the Royalists cut the telegraph/phone lines.

Of course, simply by facilitating more rapid communication networks, we'd see faster economic growth and technological growth.

 

[Workable Goblin]

I'd caution from thinking that we'd see non-combustion sources of energy supplant combustion. It is quite likely that this scenario would still lead to coal and then oil being the predominant sources of energy - remember that most electricity in the world comes from burning coal.

That's not actually true, though coal is the largest single source of electricity--actually only about a third of electricity globally comes from coal nowadays, and it was about 40% in the 1980s and 1990s. I guess the share of electricity generated by coal combustion might have been above 50% in the 1950s and 1960s, but earlier than that it might very well have been second to hydropower; at any rate, hydroelectricity was of great importance in early electrification schemes and was certainly the second largest source of electricity globally until the 1990s or so (ahead of nuclear, oil, or gas, with nuclear being first to approximately match it and then gas coming ahead later in the 1990s and since then). In any case, there are plenty of applications where it requires very advanced technology to use electricity to replace combustion, such as most forms of propulsion other than electric railroads, and there are many chemical uses of coal, oil, and gas that are unthreatened by any amount of electricity from hydropower. So it doesn't really matter in the greater scheme of things except that hydropower will be of greater importance.

A more secure prediction would be that, in the 19th century, you'll see intra-city rail networks be dominated by electric locomotives likely from the start. Since one of the big hurdles to overcome for subways was what to do with exhaust smoke, if electricity is more advanced, expect to see the first real subway systems being built maybe as much as a half century early - London's Tube could be a product of the 1840s-50s.

You are also pretty likely to see mainline electric locomotives earlier as well. Electric locomotives, like diesels, offer a number of technical advantages over steam locomotives in terms of being easier to stop and start, not needing to be kept hot, not having a risk of boiler explosion, being operable with fewer crew, and so on. Relative to diesels, they offer lower operational costs at the expense of higher capital costs...but, well, earlier electricity is going to boost electric locomotives, probably not diesel locomotives as much. There was continual experimentation with internal combustion engines throughout the early Industrial Revolution but there weren't any practical ones until the 1860s, which suggests to me that there were fundamental breakthroughs, probably in materials, that were needed before such an engine could be made practical.

 

[Polish Eagle]

A more secure prediction would be that, in the 19th century, you'll see intra-city rail networks be dominated by electric locomotives likely from the start. Since one of the big hurdles to overcome for subways was what to do with exhaust smoke, if electricity is more advanced, expect to see the first real subway systems being built maybe as much as a half century early - London's Tube could be a product of the 1840s-50s.

Napoleon III's Paris Metro, anyone?