AHC: Wank Renewable Energy.

Which states are going to benefit more from this?

  • United States

    Votes: 12 60.0%
  • United Kingdom

    Votes: 4 20.0%
  • France

    Votes: 1 5.0%
  • Germany

    Votes: 2 10.0%
  • Italy

    Votes: 1 5.0%
  • Russian Empire

    Votes: 1 5.0%
  • Spain

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Ottoman Empire/Turkey

    Votes: 5 25.0%
  • Others

    Votes: 1 5.0%

  • Total voters
    20
With no more than three PoDs in the second half of the XIX century have more than 10% of the world's production of energy in 1913 coming from renewable sources.
Edit: this isn't (But could be.) a "No Petroleum exploitation" discussion.
 
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Dolan

Banned
You do realizes that this is what actually happened Historically, right?

Diesel engine was designed running by peanut and or palm oil first.

City lamps originally used Whale Oil (alright, that need Whale Farming, but still).

Early internal combustion engines run with Alcohol distilled from grain or corn.

The thing you need to avoid large scale adoption of petroleum based oil is to avoid or at least significantly halt oil discovery altogether, because at early 20th century, petroleum is being far cheaper than the renewable alternatives.

In the world with no major petroleum exploitation, expect Europeans to hold on their tropical colonies over all those palm oils.
 
With no more than three PoDs in the second half of the XIX century have more than 10% of the world's production of energy in 1913 coming from renewable sources.
Edit: this isn't (But could be.) a "No Petroleum exploitation" discussion.

Well, this means that you have to "convert" late XIX century Britain and France into, in the best case scenario, Russia: they still had been widely using wood instead of coal for the household purposes. Even better, copy Central Asian states/areas: they were widely using a dried manure for heating.
 
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Dolan

Banned
I know this is pre-1900, otherwise the requested PoD(s) wouldn't be in the second half of the XIX century.
my point is still valid though, halt Petroleum exploration... Maybe have several highly regarded geologists theorized about Tectonic plates being floated on (or lubricated with) Petroleum, that taking them in large scale would risk apocalyptic earthquakes.

And thus Petroleum deposits were known, but those end up being regarded as vital tectonic parts forbidden to be taken in large scale.
 
my point is still valid though, halt Petroleum exploration... Maybe have several highly regarded geologists theorized about Tectonic plates being floated on (or lubricated with) Petroleum, that taking them in large scale would risk apocalyptic earthquakes.

And thus Petroleum deposits were known, but those end up being regarded as vital tectonic parts forbidden to be taken in large scale.

Most probably at that time (second half of the XIX century) noises made by these geologists would be safely ignored.
 
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Biodiesel could only help the two countries that werethe two agricultural powers in 1900: Russia and the United States. Their exported wheat (and other agricultural goods for that matter) was massive in comparison to everyone else. Most European countries had to raise agricultural trade barriers to protect their farmers and compete against them. With the introduction of the mechanized harvester, European field design and size were essentially obsolete. Many of the countries you listed were net importers of grain, so how are they going to feed their people and also have even more grain for energy needs.

Unsurprisingly, the countries with the most arable land (USA and Russia) would be the ones who would most benefit from using plant based fuel.

You could make some arguments for Australia and some South American countries (Brazil, Argentina), but on what was listed.....Its US/Russia
 
my point is still valid though, halt Petroleum exploration... Maybe have several highly regarded geologists theorized about Tectonic plates being floated on (or lubricated with) Petroleum, that taking them in large scale would risk apocalyptic earthquakes.

And thus Petroleum deposits were known, but those end up being regarded as vital tectonic parts forbidden to be taken in large scale.
How about wanking Hydroelectricity since the beginning?
•Pacinotti and Gramme met and work together. Their Dynamo is ready in 1858 (OTL Pacinotti's dynamo 1860 and Gramme's dynamo 1878.).
•Pelton wheel in the 60's (OTL 70's.).
Only to begin with the most well-known.
 
Unsurprisingly, the countries with the most arable land (USA and Russia) would be the ones who would most benefit from using plant based fuel.

You could make some arguments for Australia and some South American countries (Brazil, Argentina), but on what was listed.....Its US/Russia

Very good and very interesting.
 
How about wanking Hydroelectricity since the beginning?
•Pacinotti and Gramme met and work together. Their Dynamo is ready in 1858 (OTL Pacinotti's dynamo 1860 and Gramme's dynamo 1878.).
•Pelton wheel in the 60's (OTL 70's.).
Only to begin with the most well-known.

Production of hydro-energy has its limitations. You usually need reasonably big rivers and the dams. And they are anything but "environmentally neutral", as experience of the SU demonstrated. Besides, even on the major rivers you can built only a limited number of them and you have to attend to a problem of passing electricity over the big distances (which, among other things, requires an advanced metallurgy, which requires a lot of coal).

You can also use peat-based power stations (in Russia 20% of extracted peat is used for energy generation, peat provides around 6.2% of Finland's annual energy production) and use it for household heating (or, probably more important, use peat fires to dry malted barley as some Scotch whisky distilleries are doing) which goes back all the way to at least the Romans.
 
Plunge the world in a depression that makes the Great Depression look like the Roaring Twenties. It simply can't be done folks. The world can't be powered by wishing real hard. The planet simply doesn't get hot enough. Even the hottest spots on the planet can heat air to less then 57 degrees C https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_weather_records#Highest_temperatures_ever_recorded . Water is harder to heat than air and stone age humans can boil water with a few sticks of wood. To get any sort of useful amount of energy out of the pitiful supply available you need to use huge tracts of land. Face it folks to power a modern economy you have two choices nuclear and fossil fuels.
 
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Plunge the world in a depression that makes the Great Depression look like the Roaring Twenties. It simply can't be done folks. The world can't be powered by wishing real hard. The planet simply doesn't get hot enough. Even the hottest spots on the planet can heat air to less then 57 degrees C https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_weather_records#Highest_temperatures_ever_recorded . Water is harder to heat than air and stone age humans can do that with a few sticks of wood. To get any sort of useful amount of energy out of the pitiful supply available you need to use huge tracts of land. Face it folks to power a modern economy you have two choices nuclear and fossil fuels.

Of course, it couldn't be done without stopping most of the OTL progress which was happening in the late XIX. And none of the alternatives theoretically available in the late XIX would be "ecologically neutral" (which is presumably the whole idea behind the initial question).
 
Of course, it couldn't be done without stopping most of the OTL progress which was happening in the late XIX. And none of the alternatives theoretically available in the late XIX would be "ecologically neutral" (which is presumably the whole idea behind the initial question).

Given none of the alternatives in the 21st are "ecologically neutral" as it would take vast tracks of habitat to do so that is certainly true.
 
Given none of the alternatives in the 21st are "ecologically neutral" as it would take vast tracks of habitat to do so that is certainly true.
Not only that but keep in mind that creation of big artificial water reservoirs for hydro power stations can (and did) result in a local climate change.
 
Charcoal could solve a lot of this. Let's have mesquites and acacias from the American Southwest/Mexico and Australia introduced to Africa in the 17th/18th centuries--maybe even the 16th century given Spanish expeditions in the Americas and potential early European expeditions to Australia. These plants have nutritious seeds for mixing into flour and make good charcoal, albeit as recent experience has shown, need to be planned around (of course, said planning could benefit central governments, like those in North Africa wanting to suppress Berber pastoralists). By the 19th century, we can have not only Africa but also much of the Americas and Australia and maybe even some drier parts of Europe and Asia managing these trees for charcoal and food, at the cost of using the land for other purposes.
 
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