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Dutch Build Windmills for Multiple Uses
"The mill reached its greatest size and its most efficient form in the hands of the Dutch engineers toward the end of the sixteenth century... The Dutch provinces... developed the windmill to the fullest possible degree: it ground the grain produced on the rich meadows, it sawed the wood... and it ground the spices... -
First Steam Engine Developed in England to Pump Water Out of Coal Mines
Thomas Newcomen's invention was the first machine to provide significantly large amounts of power not derived from muscle, water, or wind... If I were to attempt anything so simple-minded as to pick a birthday for the industrial revolution, it would be the first day that Newcomen's machine began operating in 1712 -
First Hydrogen Fuel Cell Developed to Generate Electricity
In 1800, British scientists William Nicholson and Anthony Carlisle had described the process of using electricity to decompose water into hydrogen and oxygen. But combining the gases to produce electricity and water was, according to Grove, 'a step further that any hitherto recorded.' Grove realized that by combining several sets of these electrodes in a series circuit he might 'effect the decomposition of water by means of its composition.' He soon accomplished this feat with the device he name -
First Commercial Oil Well Drilled by Edwin Drake in Pennsylvania; Kerosene Begins to Displace Other Lamp Fuels
Kerosene, which Abraham Gesner, a Canadian chemist, discovered how to distill from petroleum in 1853, proved in many circumstances to be a better choice... In 1859, E.L. Drake... was searching for it [petroleum] at the suitably named Oil Creek in Titusville, Pennsylvania. He rejected the idea of digging for it, and chose to seek it out with a drill driven by a small steam engine. He hit it on August 29 at 71 feet, initiating America's and the world's first petroleum rush... Before that boom ende -
John D. Rockefeller Forms Standard Oil and Develops Petroleum as a Major Energy Source in the US
Rockefeller formed the Standard Oil Company of Ohio in 1870. In the early 1870s, oil exploration in Pennsylvania's Oil Creek region grew significantly, and the effort would expand to other states and nations during the next decade. By 1879, Standard controlled 90 percent of U.S. refining capacity, as well as the majority of rail lines between urban centers in the northeastern U.S. and many leasing companies at various sites of oil speculation throughout the country. Due to Rockefeller's efforts -
Birth of the Modern Oil Industry: Lucas Gusher and the Discovery of Texas' Vast Spindletop Oil Field
"The modern oil industry was born on a hill in southeastern Texas. This hill was formed by a giant underground dome of salt as it moved slowly towards the surface. As it crept, it pushed the earth that was in its path higher and higher. This dome was known by several names, but the one that stuck was 'Spindletop'. Through the later half of the 19th century, Pennsylvania had been the most oil-productive state in the country. All that changed on January 10th, 1901... -
Worlds First Flex Fuel Vehicle, the Ford Model-T, Goes into Mass Production
Ethanol-fueled vehicles date back to the 1880s when Henry Ford designed a car that ran solely on ethanol. He later built the first flex fuel vehicle: a 1908 Model T designed to operate on either ethanol or gasoline." -
World's First Geothermal Power Plant Is Built in California
John D. Grant drilled a geothermal well and ran a small direct-current generator which was used to provide electricity for lighting The Geysers resort. However, because the materials used at that time could not withstand the geothermal steam environment and because of the difficulties of drilling for geothermal steam, this resource could not compete at that time with other low-cost, easier-to-develop energy resources." -
First Commercial Wind Turbines Sold to Generate Electricity on Remote Farms
Marcellus and Joe Jacobs develop the first commercially available wind turbine for electricity generation. -
Hoover Dam, the World's Largest Hydroelectric Power Plant, Is Built
Hoover Dam is completed on the Colorado River in Arizona in 1935, four years after construction began in 1931. At the time of its completion, the Hoover Dam was the largest hydroelectric producer in the world. The dam remains the largest producer of hydroelectricity in the world until 1948. -
First Commercial Nuclear Power Plant Begins Operation in Shippingport, Pennsylvania
The first large-scale nuclear power plant in the world began operating in Shippingport, Pennsylvania, on December 2, 1957 - exactly 15 years after Enrico Fermi demonstrated the first sustained nuclear reaction. The Duquesne Light Company of Pittsburgh built and operated the Shippingport plant on a site it owned on the Ohio River. The company also contributed to the cost of developing the government-owned reactor. Three years later, the Shippingport plant began supplying electricity to the Pittsb -
Federal Involvement in Wind Energy Development Advances Wind Energy Technology
From the mid 1970's through the mid 1980's the United States government worked with industry to advance the technology and enable large commercial wind turbines. This effort was led by NASA [National Aeronautics and Space Administration] at the Lewis Research Center in Cleveland, Ohio and was an extraordinarily successful government research and development activity. With funding from the National Science Foundation and later the Department of Energy (DOE), a total of 13 experimental wind turbin -
Ivanpah, the World's Largest Concentrated Solar Power Generation Plant, Goes Online
Ivanpah significantly expands the use of CSP technologies within the United States. Its innovative power-tower technology utilizes a field of mirrors called heliostats to track the sun and focus sunlight onto boilers that sit atop 459-foot tall towers. When the sunlight hits the boiler, it heats the water inside to create superheated steam used to spin an electricity-generating turbine."